1
ANGLO-NEPAL WAR ( BRITISH VERSION)
As the Gurkhas advance westward, they were paced on their southern flank
by the British, who were simultaneously pushing back the frontiers of their
north-Indian empire. The eighteenth century was the age of the decline and
fall of the Indian empire of the Mogul1 Emperors of Delhi. Internal decadence
enabled the Emperor’s powerful provincial governors-such as the Nawabs of
Bengal and Oudh in the north and the Nizam of the Deccan in south- to
assert their independence; while successive whirlwind raids by the monarchs
of Persia and Afghanistan hastened the demise of Imperial authority without
providing an alternative Muslim hegemony. The chief contenders for the
Mogul legacy were the Hindus and the Europeans. The Hindu revival was
probably inevitable. Hindu culture is essentially marital in spirit (Gandhi’s
interpretation of the ethic of non-violence to mean the prohibition of war being
a modern departure), and the Mogul rulers, alien by virtue of their origin and
their religious, had never been completely accepted by the subject races. The
resurgent Hindus were the Sikhs, the Gurkhas and the Marathas. Their
European rivals were the French and the British.
The Sikhs were a Jat sect-reformed Hindus, impatient at once of
idolatry, cast and asceticism. After many vicissitudes, they wrested the
Punjab and Sirhind from the Afghans, and dominated a turbulent medley of
Turks, Pathans Rajputs and Jats as a martial aristocracy. The Gurkhas
seized the hills, with little opposition from anyone. The Marathas remained
heirs to the rest, despite a resounding defeat at the hands of the Afghans at
Panipat in 1761, but were cheated by the British of their inheritance. They
were a wiry tribe of western Indian, which in first decade of the eighteenth
century became the agent of Imperial authority in the Deccan and south-west
India. From Poona, the Peshwas (hereditary ministers) -the Maratha
monarchy was otiose from an early stage -directed imperialist expeditions
which, by 1771, had made them masters of all central India, Rajputana,
Malwa and Berar, and custodians of the Emperor himself. But the polity split
into five independent portions. The state of Gwalior, Indore, Berar (or
Nagpur), and Gujarat continued to acknowledge the titular suzerainty of the
1
Mogul = Mongol; but the dynasty was in fact of central Asian Turkish origin, descended from Tamberlain the Great.
2
Peshwas of Poona, but the so-called ‘Maratha confederacy’ invariably
disintegrated in times of crisis, and therein lay its rivals’ greatest advantage.
The territorial power of the East India Company, a consortium of
merchants trading under charter from the British Crown, germinated, like that
of the Marathas, in southern India. Its first factories were at Surat and
Bombay on the west, and at Madras on the east, or Coromandel, coast. But
the company’s wars in the south, during the second half of the eighteenth
century, were less against the Marathas then against the French, for even
after Clive had captured the last French Colonies (1761), a powerful Gallic
influence persisted at Poona and at the independent Muslim court of Mysore.
The wars fought by the English with Poona and Mysore between 1779 and
1799 were basically projection into Indian politics of the Anglo-French rivalry.
The Company’s real struggle against the Marathas took place in northern and
central India.
It was self-defence and skillful opportunism, rather than premeditated
ambition that turned this group of British merchants into the rulers of an
empire. The Company had trading posts in the area of Calcutta from the end
of seventeenth century, but with no territory and no army at first. Harassment
from the Marathas in Berar and from capricious Nawabs of Bengal, plus
greed for the reputedly immense treasure of the Nawabs, led Clive to form an
army and claim a share of influence in the internal politics of Bengal. The
share soon grew into monopoly, and the Company began to control the
Nawabs. It acquired tenant rights to certain territories, and in 1765 became a
landed potentate in its own right when the Emperor made it Dewan (fiscal
administrator in theory, farmer of revenues in fact) of the three provinces of
Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. With these new responsibilities, the Company
began to develop an administrative identity. The main emphasis during the
next thirty years was on curbing the Company’s own servants, whose orgy of
extortion following the devolution of power in Bengal had brought the
Company near to bankruptcy; but consolidation involved a certain extension
of territorial power as well. In 1772 the fertile province of Kuch Bihar, wedged
between the northern frontier of Bengal and Bhutan, was reincorporated into
the territory of Bengal after long independence. Its Raja appealed to the
Company for help against the invading mountaineers of Bhutan, and Warren
Hasting, Governor of Bengal at the time, was glad of this opportunity to
annex the territory-though he firmly disclaimed ‘remote project of conquest’,
and stressed that his only aim was to complete the outline of the Company’s
3
dominions. A policy of self-defence, mixed with need for money, led hasting
to turn his attention to the Muslim principality of Oudh, long effectively
independent of Delhi, but now effete. To protect Bengal against the Afghans
in Rohilkhand and the Marathas in Delhi, Oudh was made a buffer state and
provided with the protective force, for which it was compelled to pay a
subsidy.
The Marathas and the English remained in uneasy truce until the arrival
of Lord Wellesley, as Governor-General in 1798. Wellesley, brother of the
Duke of Wellesley, was a little man with an Olympian manner and panoramic
vision. He viewed Indian politics in relation to those of Europe, and conceived
an elaborate scheme of alliances with the native state designed to preclude
the subversion of the Company’s position in India by the French. The Nawab
of Oudh was constrained to disband his own army, accept an increased
subsidiary force, cede Rohilkhand and all territory between the Ganges and
the Jumna in lieu of payment, employ no Europeans and level the Company
in control of his foreign policy. The weakest of the independent rulers, the
Nizam of the Deccan, meekly submitted to similar term; but Mysore, whose
ruler Tipu Sultan flaunted his sympathy for the French in an attempt to
preserve his independence, had to be coerced. It was Wellesley’s attempt to
bring the Marathas into this grand system of British hegemony which finally
precipitated the long-pending clash between them and the Company. Poona
and Gujarat agreed to accept troops, pay subsides and forgoes the
employment of Europeans; but the other three states vigorously demurred at
this betrayal of Maratha independence. Gwalior and Berar were at war with
the company from 1802 to 1804, but were then compelled submit. Only Berar
accepted a subsidiary force, but each received a British Resident and agreed
not to employ Europeans. The blind Emperor, Shah Alam, was rescued from
the clutches of Sindhia of Gwalior and set up as the mediatized King of Delhi,
under the protection of a British resident. All Maratha territory between the
Jumna and the Ganges was annexed by the Company. It was combined with
the estates in the same area ceded by Oudh in 1801, and made part of the
Bengal Presidency under the designation ‘Ceded and Conquered
Provinces’.2 Holkar of Indore then took up arms, and prolonged the contest
until 1805, causing unexpected discomfort to the English commanders, Lake
and Monson. Learning of this, the home authorities made now their
2
Later called the North-West Provinces.
4
displeasure in such a way that Wellesley was forced to resign. They had
been uneasy about him for some times. He lorded it over his council, openly
despised his employers, humiliated native princes and seemed to be loading
the Company with debts and barren conquests. Thus, with his plans only half
realized in the crucial area of central India, Wellesley was obliged to return
home, and his successor, Lord Minto, was instructed to pursue a policy of
retrenchment and neutrality. British protection was withdrawn from the state
of Rajputana, and Indore and Gwalior, dangerous as wounded wasps, ware
left to conspire uncurbed. The territories of the Company and its clients had
by this time assumed roughly the configuration of a huge question mark,
following the northern and western outline of the subcontinent. The Ceded
and Conquered Provinces, Oudh, and Bihar and Bengal of the hook; and
Ceylon (administered by the Crown) the stop. In the open-ended state of
central India were the Marathas and the Rajputs.
In the year between Wellesley’s resignation and the arrival of Lord
Hasting as Governor-General in 1813, their were serious confrontations with
the two reaming members of the trio of Hindu communities claiming the
reversion of Mogul authority in northern India---the Sikhs and the Gurkhas. It
seemed possible that the Company would find itself in conflict with one or
both of these powers while Gwalior and Indore still remained sufficiently
strong to seek revenge. This was the nightmare of a Hindu confederacy
which alarmed Lord Hasting. The Sikh communities straddled the Sutlaj river,
divided between the Punjab and the old Mogul province of Sirhind. Raja
Ranjit Singh of Lahore had become the most powerful Sikhs monarch, and
he sought to extend his control to the Sikhs on the other side of river. To
prevent this, Minto was compelled to act against the letter of his instruction
and grand British protection to the Sirhind Sikhs, thus pushing further west, to
the left bank of the Sutlaj, the starting place of the hook in the question mark
of British territory. The Gurkha empire was contiguous throughout its whole
length to territories either administered or protected by the Company. Before
long, both the Company and its hill neighbour found that with new dominions
they had inherited local disputes about boards.
There exists no greater contrast then that between the countries
occupied by the Gurkhas, where the earth appears to have been petrified in
the full violence of some primeval fermentation, and that in northern India
then under the English Company’s sway, which is as immense plain, level as
a lake and reminiscent of the claim, luminous landscapes of Claude le
5
Lorrain, with their groves and deliquescent distance. From the Ganges
eastward these provinces were separate from the Himalayan foothill by a
swampy forest of sal, elephant grass and bamboo, where the air was dank,
close, and ceaselessly vibrating, with the noises of the mosquitoes, cicadas
and frogs. This fringe, called Tarai along most of the Nepalese border,
Morang in extreme south-east Nepal, and divided into sections called duars
on the frontier of Bhutan, is still the big game hunter’s paradise. At the time of
which we are speaking, it was intensely malarial throughout the summer and
monsoon months, from April to October-a place of dread, to be avoided at all
cost, save by the Tharus and other indigenous tribes, which were immune to
the infection. The mosquito’s responsibility being then unknown, the awl
(malarial fever) was attributed to some noxious miasma. According to the
native this emanated from the months of large serpents who inhabited the
northern mountains. The European view was that it derived from putrefying
vegetation or stagnant water. Its effects were swift and horrifying: fever and
vomiting, followed in a few hours by raving madness and death. The
Company’s northern territories, which stretched into this inhospitable region,
were bisected by the province of Oudh. West of Oudh there where the Ceded
and Conquered Province, of which Rohilkhand and Saharanpur were the
most northern; and east of Oudh there where the district of Gorakhpur,
Saran, Tirhut, Purnea and, in the extreme north-east of Bengal across the
Tista river, the district of Rangpur.These where the moffussil---the ‘interior’ or
‘up country’ area, as opposed to the Presidency capital, Calcutta, which
might be up to three months’ journey away. European were few and far
between. Besides the handful of magistrates, revenue collectors and military
men, there were only those few who had managed to secure’ licenses--essential for any one wished to live more than ten miles from Calcutta. They
were mostly indigo planters, brutish and boisterous individuals, whose
handsome villas with spacious verandas were becoming numerous in
Gorakhpur, Tirhut and Purnea. European life centred around the civil station.
Each composed of district Judge,3 Collector, Registrar, Surgeon and
Postmaster, with a few army officers attached to guards and escorts, these
where remote pockets of British society in country where the British had
bravely been heard of and where white faces still provoked consternation and
amazement. There were no all-weather roads, so the military depots--Dinapur, Ghazipur, Chunar, Cawnpore, Meerut---were built close the river
3
Who also exercised the function of magistrate at this time.
6
Ganges, which remained the principal highway. From these centers troops
were distributed among the numerous outposts and frontier pickets.
The districts of Saran, Tirhut, Purnea and Rangpur formed part of the
territories of which the fiscal administration was granted by the Emperor to
the Company in 1765.4 They were divided into the territorial assignments of
various zemindars, who were, strictly speaking, hereditary rent collectors, but
who by the term of Lord Cornwallis’s land settlement were recognized as
proprietors. The rents for which they were liable to the Company were fixed in
perpetuity. When the land settlement was made, the Company’s officials
were reluctant to concern themselves with defining the boundaries of the
estate for which each zemindar contracted to pay the revenues. Interference
in matter of this nature was held to be an infringement of the sacrosanct
principle of privacy. This was not the province of revenue administrators, but
of the civil court, should zemindars feel disposed to make the use of their
service in cause of uncertainty. The result was, in the words of Sir George
Campbell, that ‘even the very fast step towards the roughest settlement of
modern days, the definition of boundaries, was not taken... There was a mere
a register of rent-paying estates, with the name of the proprietors, but no
means of identifying arose. When two disputing zemindars were tenants of
the same government, no grave issue was involved; but when one was a
Clint of the Company and the other a tenant or agent of a neighboring
sovereign power, then a small domestic problem was transformed into an
international boarder dispute. In the days of feckless Mogul rule, the
zemindars in this districts had continuously disputed with the hill rajas about
possession of the rich lowland boarder areas; and after the company made
them its clients and revenue contractors, its officers where soon faced with
an avalanche of claims and complaint. Village and tracts where reported to
have been sized either by the Bhutanese or by the people of the Raja of
Nepal. It was often impossible to make a satisfaction settlement. A collector
or magistrate might be expected to form a judgement on the basis of quite
preposterous evidence. The altercation between the Raja of Bhutan and the
Company’s zemindars of Baikantpur, whose mutual boarder meandered back
and fourth across the shifting Tista, was typically. When the Magistrate of
Rangpur went to inspect the boundary of an estate belonging to Bhutan on
the west bank of the boundary of an estate belonging to Bhutan on the west
4
Gorkhpur was ceded by the Nawab of Oudh in 1801.
7
bank of the river, he found that its distinguishing features were occasional
streams, rivulets and ridges of earth. Elsewhere his only direction was the
memory of his guide, who professed to recognize the frontier by the different
colourings of the grass 'and other marks of the like nature which seemed to
exist nowhere but in the fertility of the imagination'. The Raja of Kuch Bihar
was in incessant dispute with the Bhutanese authorities concerning the
villages in the area of their common frontier. In 1809, Company set upa
commission to examine the claims and counter –claims in question and even
sent military assistance to its vassal when the inquiry indicated his complaints
against Bhutanese, to be justified. Sometimes, encroachments were flagrant.
The Bhutanese, for example, seize the estate of Bidyagong, in the extreme
north-east of Rangpur, and asserted their right to nominate a successor when
the adjacent zemindari of Bijni became vacant. But such remote and complex
contests were more tiresome than important to the British official, The
Magistrate of Rangpur reported the Bidyagong affair, but the government
decide than an annual rent of forty elephants was a loss too trivial to warrant
giving offence to Bhutan. Bijni, way over on the Manas river, was the
remotest ramification of the province of Bengal, and vertically nothing was
known about the country and the nature of its connections with the Mogul
empire. When the Bhutanese appointed their own candidate as zemindar in
1791, the British authorities held a desultory inquiry, but forbore to press their
own right, established by the investigation, to nominate a successor.
Company zemindars in areas farther west accused the Gurkhas of
usurpation. Their complaint were numerous, elaborate, insistent, and often
totally without foundation They were bothersome to the collectors, busy with
the administration of districts of vast extant; and embarrassing to the
government, which wished to avoid offending Nepal, and which, became its
revenues had been settled on a permanent basis, was not the loser in case
of encroachment. At first there was no international problem. The Gurkhas
showed themselves anxious to have these disputes settled peaceable, and
the Company seemed prepared to make concession at the expense of its
own clamouring zemindares. In 1795 Cornwallis assured the Raja of Nepal
that he was willing to define the long-uncertain boarder between the Morang
and the district of Purnea in exact conformity with his representation; and
write and petitions from cheated zemindars of Tirhut were left to gather dust
in the Collector's files. In the zone of the east of Oudh, the boundary between
the Ceded and Conquered Provinces and the Gurkha colonies of Kumanu
8
and Garhwal had been made so uncertain by the collusion and inefficiency of
the Oudh offers who hade preceded the British, and accurate record and
surveys were so wanting, that the Company's servants were perplexed as to
how react when they saw the Gurkhas move into a fresh frontier area. Often,
indeed, these incursions remained long unnoticed, for in the early years of
British administrations of these territories the Company's revenue
assessments were necessarily tentative,5 And its authority very tenuous.
Rohilkhand had declined into a state of anarchy under the combined effect of
Maratha invasion and maladministration by Oudh. Cultivation and farmers
had relapsed into a state of instinctive resistance to all revenue collectors.
Organized brigandage was rife, exacerbated by the continued existence of
the small independent state of Rampur and Sirdhana, which were
sanctuaries for fugitives from British Justice. One of the first Company
collectors in Moradabad felt so insecure that he threw elegance to the winds
and made an incongruous moat and mud rampart around his handsome
cutchery. To the west, across the Ganges in the district of Saharanpur,
almost every village was surrounded by a wall or ditch-testimonies to a long
torment inflicted by Sikh raiders from across the Jumna. The large new
military station of Meerut, outside the old town, had to be built on land
reclaimed from the jungle; and crime was so rampant in the area that it was
not unusual to stumble across the corpse of a murder victim even on the
plain between the city and the cantonments. With so much else to distract
them, it is scarcely surprising that the tiny number of British officials gave only
perfunctory attention to the settlement of the northern regions, and only scant
notice to the subsequent Nepalese incursions. Indeed, the marauding Mewati
and Amir tribes had made alarums and excursions along the northern frontier
so unexceptional, that such intrusions were often lost in the general
confusion. Then again, British officers were scared by the climate of the Tarai
and tended to avoid it, save for a few weeks in the healthy season, when they
might hunt big game. It was quite by accident that the Magistrate of Bareilly
noticed, in 1811, that the Gurkhas had built a fort in Kheri. This was a remote
appendix of territory east of the Kali, wedged between Oudh and the hills. It
5
Wellesley proposed applying a permanent settlement on the Bengal pattern after a the-year interval of shorter
experimental assessments, but in the event it was a thirty-year settlement that was made. Their were no zemindars of
the Bengal type in these provinces, and the revenue contracts were made with the chiefs among proprietors of groups of
villages.
9
had been assessed as part of the Ceded and Conquered Provinces, but its
revenue had never actually been realized by the Company. The Magistrate
was sure sure that the Gurkhas had not been in occupation of the tract two
years previously, but, as he pointed out, no one could be sure that they were
not entitled to it. 'Such is the undefined boundary between the two
governments', he wrote, 'and our want of local information of the extent of our
territories in the unexplored tract of country along the foot of the hills, that
doubts may be entertained whether even the acquisitions of the Nepalese
which are stated to appertain to the pergana of Kherigarh can be pronounced
encroachment on our territories.'
Obviously, such a state of affair could not be permitted to continue. The
Directors of the Company wrote from London to censure the 'want of
vigilance' or the 'defect in the system of management' which allowed
boundaries to elude definition and anarchy to persist. 'It is unnecessary for us
to insist upon the importance of having the limits of our dominions accurately
defined', they pronounced, in February 1814. But the boundary question had
already boiled to a crisis before the ship carrying this dispatch reached
Calcutta. Long even before it was written, both the British and the Gorkha
governments had changed their attitude towards the frontier problem. When
the Thapas acceded to power, the Gurkha durbar became pugnacious and
uncompromising. At the same time, the Company's government decided that
its own laxity and complaisance in these matters had gone on long enough.
The border must be clearly defined, once and for all, even at the risk of
displeasing Kathmandu.
In one area, at least, defining the border was as simple as drawing a
line on a map and then warning the Gurkhas that they would cross it at their
peril. This could be done in the frontier regions adjacent to the recent Gurkha
conquests in the western hills. Here the Gurkhas had had no time to establish
themselves in the lowlands. As they held Kumaun and the territory beyond
only by right of conquest, they had no a priori right to parts of these provinces
which they did not actually occupy. Seizure of the hilly part of a raja's
kingdom gave them no claim to the lowland portion if the raja had not formally
resigned it and was able to defend it. Now the rajas expelled from the
western hills were able to defend their lowland possessions, because the
Company decided that it would support them in their determination to do so.
It was made plain to the Gurkhas that they would invade these tracts below
the hills only on pain of war with the British. Because the Gurkhas were not
10
yet established below the hills, and because they had no treaty rights, it
proved a simple and effective way of fixing boundaries. The Calcutta
government, however, did not dispute the Gurkhas' claim to the mountain
territories, and resisted considerable pressure to reinstate the rajas in the
hills. Early in 1810, Amar Singh Thapa announced his intention of occupying
certain villages on the plains of Sirhind on the justification that they belonged
to Sirmur and Hindur, all of whose territories were now his by right of
conquest. Colonel David Ochterlony, at Ludhiana, was Agent for the affairs of
the Sirhind Sikhs brought under the protection of the Company by Minto in
1809. He had already been given clear instructions for such a contingency.
He was to inform the Gurkha commander that all territories below the line of
the foothills, whether previously attached to hill states or not, were now under
the protection of the Company; but at the same time he was to make it clear
that the Company had no interest whatever in the fate of territories within the
mountains. But Ochterlony was spoiling for a fight. He urged that the Gurkhas
be requested not only to give up their new possessions in the plains, but also
to restore the Dehra and Kayarda Duns, in the first range of foothills, to the
Garhwal and Sirmur royal families respectively. This, he claimed, would
create a useful buffer region between the Gurkha and the British spheres of
interest, besides enhancing the Company's prestige in the view of all the
Gurkhas, whom he disdained as 'a body of ill-armed and unaccoutrements,
and constitution of a British native battalion and who might have been
successfully resisted in such a country by less than a third of their numbers'. 6
Governmet patiently pointed out that it would be futile and discreditable to
make such a demand, for it was unlikely that the Gurkhas would comply, and
the expediency of compulsion was 'more than questionable'. In the event,
Amar Singh did not act on his claim to the lowland villages, and the use of
force even in the plains was unnecessary.
In the middle of 1813 there was a second frontier crisis. Amar Singh
Thapa's men seized six villages which two of Ochterlony's Sikh protégés,
Patiala and Hindur, affirmed belonged to their lowland possessions. Amar
Singh claimed that they belonged to Sirmur and Kionthal, states in the hills
which he had conquered and to all of whose estates he had right; and he
asked for time to make reference to Kathmandu before relinquishing them.
Ochterlony agreed to the delay-but only because relinquishing them.
6
Ludhiana Records, pp.219-20.
11
Octherlony agreed to the delay-but only because the season was not yet fit
for military operations. He was convinced, or affected to be convinced, that
Amar Singh had no intention of abandoning the villages. Brishly, and with
obvious enthusiasm, he set about making preparations for a punitive
expedition, whose object was to be the expulsion of the Gurkhas from all the
hill areas west of the Ganges. This brought him into contact with Captain
Hyder Hearsey, a half-caste who had made who had made his fortune by
fighting as a mercenary with various native princes in the turbulent years
before 1804 and by marrying a Muslim princess of Cambay Hearsey had in
his pocket his own plan for an invasion of the western hills. It had been
concocted in consultation with Harak Devi Joshi, the quondam kingmaker of
Kumaun, and Hearsey had a special interest in its implementation, because
in his other pocket he had a deed of right to Dehra Dun. He had bought this
for a few thousand rupees in 1811, form the impoverished and exiled heir to
the Kingdom of Garhwal. Octherlony proceeded on the assumption that the
Governor-General, Lord Minto, would be of the opinion 'that the best way of
enforcing the restitution of the disputed villages . . . would be to show our
ability to do much more'; and his own 'firm persuasion' was 'that Amar Singh
Thapa will compel us to dislodge his troops from below the hills'. But his
assumption and his persuasion were wrong, and both his ambitions and
Hearsey's hopes were for the moment to remain unsatisfied. 'It is . .. far from
being the wish or intention of the Governor-General in Council to engage in
any extended scheme of operations such as that contemplated [by you]. His
Lordship . . . . is, on the country, desirous of maintaining the existing relation
of friendship with the Nepalese by amicable negotiation, if practicable', wrote
the Political Secretary. At the very most, and then only as a last resort force
might be used to eject them from the lowlands.7 Meanwhile Amar Singh
Thapa, confuting Ochterlony's confident assertion that he had been bluffing,
did make reference to Kathmandu. The durbar made it plain that as far as it
was concerned the issue was not be settled according to whether the
Company or the Gurkhas had been in possession of them first. His
government, in fact, was far more intransigent than the Kaji himself, who was
embarrassed by these injunctions. He appealed to Ochterlony to spare his
dignity. He had occupied the villages in the sincere belief that they belonged
to the Gurkhas by right, and he could not now withdraw without losing face.
Could not the Gurkhas and the Company share the contested territory? But
7
Ludhiana Records, pp.339-44.
12
Ochterlony was obdurate, and issued an ultimatum. Though peevish and
insistent as to his right, the Kaji had no intention of risking a conflict with the
Company, and he directed his officers to withdraw. Only when he actually
inspected the disputed areas, several weeks later, did Ochterlony discover
that two of the villages were decidedly in the hills.
Amar Singh Thapa had made a genuine concession because he was
eager to try again to capture Kangra. He was convinced that the British were
preparing to cross the Sutlaj and conquer the Punjab, and his idea was to
use the occasion, with British acquiescence, to march once more against the
fortress and avenge his previous humiliation. Ochterlony peremptiorily
disavowed such intentions; but once this Gurkha had formed his own
interpretation of a situation, he was loath to change it. He continued to press
for an alliance, complained of Amar Singh's obtusensess and duplicity. But
however offensive the idea might have seemed to the British, the Gurkha can
hardly be blamed for assuming that they coveted the Punjab. Sansar Chand
of Kangra drew the same conclusion. Indians who had been dazzled by the
Company's meteoric rise could hardly be expected to associate it with
reluctance for empire. Ochterlony's refusal to respond to Amar Singh's
overtures made the Kaji feel humiliated, and his aversion to the British
deepened; but he knew better than to goad them beyond a certain point.
Almost in spite of himself, he sensed the profound unwisdom of a war with
the East India Company, and the expression of his hostility was ever
tempered by an instinctive respect for its power. Others of his race were not
so circumspect, and in negotiations over disputed borders further east words
and actions of uncontrolled impetuosity led to the collapse of negotiations
and the declaration of war.
In the frontier areas in the zone east of Oudh it was much more difficult
to define a boundary. It was too late foe the Company to draw an imaginary
line along the base of the foothills and forbid the Gurkhas to cross it. With the
consent of earlier governments and, in the case of Gorakhpur, with the
connivance of the Nawab of Oudh's officers, they had become firmly
established in the Tarai and Morang, effective inheritors of all lowland
territories formerly ruled by the hill rajas they had displaced. These hill rajas,
unlike those in the west, had not been able to protect their estates in the
plains, because the Company had not felt disposed to assist them. The
Gurkhas could therefore legitimately claim the estates as the fruits of
conquest. Now if the British and Gurkha governments were to honour the
13
limits of their respective dominations, it was essential to know exactly what
lands and villages those lowland estates had comprised. Such knowledge
was not easy to obtain, because in many cases the hill rajas were not the
proprietors of their lowland tracts, but merely tenants in them of the Nawabs
of Bengal and Oudh. In this area, then, resolving the problem was a great
deal more difficult than drawing a line on a map. Here, the frontier had to be
not created, but discovered: and this involved unpicking a complicated knot of
precedents and rights.
Such a task demanded patience, good faith, and a compromising
attitude of both sides. Until the fall of the Panres, the durbar of Kathmandu
had reciprocated the Company's spirit of concession. The political trio preeminent in Nepal in the last decade of the eighteenth century had been
anxious to remain on good terms with Calcutta. This group had consisted of
Damodar Pande, the Prime Minister; Brahma Shah, who was a chautarya
(royal hereditary counselor); and Gajraj Misra, the guru (spiritual mentor) of
the royal family. All three had fallen from power after 1803. Damodar Pande
had been executed; Brahma Shah removed to Kumaun; and Gajraj Misra
obliged to make a prolonged 'pilgrimage' to India. The new royal favourites,
Prime Minister Bhimsen Thapa, his father General Amar Thapa and the new
guru, Raganath Pandit, considered themselves more as rivals than as
vassals of the East India Company. Contacts were made with the various
native states, Nepal's relationship with China was turned to special
advantage and in exchanges with the British the old tone of cautions mistrust
gave place to one of cavalier independence. When, in 1804, General Amar
Thapa was sent to annex the territories of the Raja of Palpa, he did not stop
at the hills. He sent officers down into the department in Gorakhpur called
Butwal to collect the revenues, tenant of the Nawab of Oudh, to whose rights
in Gorakhpur the Company had now succeeded. The Gurkhas could argue
from precedent, because they had been in possession of Siuraj, an adjacent
department whose situation was similar, for sixteen years when the Nawab of
Oudh ceded Gorakhpur to the Company. But, having discovered that Butwal
was very fertile, the Governor-General was reluctant to lose the department,
and he requested the Gurkhas to evacuate it immediately. He even offered to
waive British rights to Siuraj as a compromise. But the Gurkhas were equally
loath to abandon such a rich acquisition, and would go no further than
offering to pay the Company a rent for it. This offer was refused; but the
Company refrained from pressing its claim, and as year succeeded year
14
Amar Thapa's men occupied more and more of the Butwal villages with
impunity, taking British quiescence as tacit recognition of their right.
In 1811, one of the Company's permanently settled zemindars, the
Raja of Betiya, in Saran district, took the law into his own hands and sent a
body of armed men to seize some villages occupied by the Gurkhas. The
Gurkhas claimed them as part of the inheritance of the conquered hill state of
Makwanpur, but the Raja insisted that they were part of the estates for which
he had contracted to pay rent to the Company. There was an affray, and a
Nepalese suba, or civil governor, was killed. The Gurkha Raja, outraged,
appealed to the Senior Judge at Patna, requesting him to punish the culprits.
The Judge promised that impartial justice would be done. He passed the
matter on to his subordinate, the Judge at Saran, who came to the conclusion
that the suba had been as much to blame as the Betiya Raja. Accepting this
verdict, the authorities in Calcutta decided not to chastise their zemindar; but
in view of the fact that the Butwal issue was still unresolved, they proposed
an Anglo-Nepalese commission to investigate the whole border question. The
Gurkhas chafed at what they considered to be the Company's prevarication
in favour of its own zemindars, but agreed to depute agents. For good
measure they meanwhile seized more villages in Saran, making twenty-two
in all.
The Company's chief commissioner was Major Paris Bradshaw, Head
Assistant at the Lucknow Residency. He began by investigating and
presenting the Company's claim to the Butwal and Siuraj tracts, while Mr.
Young, the Saran Magistrate's Assistant, conducted preliminary inquiries in
Saran. Paris Bradshaw was Irish, middle-aged, short, slight, dour and
archaic. He still wore the old-fashioned hair powder and pigtail. His young
brother-in-law, John Hearsey,8 found him very much 'a gentleman of the old
school. . . exceedingly prosaic'. His dispatches, with their enormous
pleonastic sentences and stilted bureaucratic expressions, betray a rigid
punctiliousness. Having no flair for persuasion, and an ill-disguised distaste
for the wiles of oriental diplomacy, he was disliked by the Nepalese, who
made several attempts to circumvent him. But it would have been impossible
for anyone, even without Bradshaw's defects, to carry out Calcutta's
instructions without incurring unpopularity. Bradshaw was instructed not only
to demand the surrender of Butwal, but in addition to revive the lapsed British
8
Later Major-General John Hearsey. He was Hyder Hearsey's half-brother.
15
claim to Siuraj. He produced sanads and rent rolls to show that both
belonged to the Company, but the Gurkhas were unmoved. The Tarai
territories were of vital importance in the economy of Nepal. Their revenues
formed the only income from land which the Kathmandu exchequer received,
because all other territory was allotted to the army in lieu of payment. Vainly,
Krishna Pandit, a Gurkha commissioner who was well-disposed towards the
British after residing in Calcutta as Nepalese vakil, suggested a compromise.
If the Raja admitted British sovereignty in the lowlands, would the Company
grant him on lease a tract along the foot of the hills? Calcutta took this as an
implicit admission of British claims, and the Raja was sent an ultimatum by
Minto. Either he gave up the lands, or they would be taken by force. Here the
matter rested for a few months; the hot season of 1813 was at hand, and any
military movements would have to be postponed until the autumn. Krishna
Pandit fell from favour for his well-intentioned but apparently unwarranted
initiative, and was recalled.
Bradshaw now proceeded to Saran, where Mr. Young had begun an
inquiry concerning the twenty-two villages. His first act was to renew an initial
condition laid down by the Calcutta government-namely, that these villages
be surrendered to the Company pending any investigation concerning the
question of right. The Gurkhas demurred, and were suspicious; but finally
they consented, and the Company's officers occupied the hamlets and their
fields. Major Bradshaw then announced that there would be no inquiry. Mr.
Young's evidence was conclusive enough, and had already established the
right of the Company to the lands.9 There was no point in conducting another
laborious investigation, because the Gurkhas, judging by their intransigence
in Butwal, were bound to reject its findings in any case. Now this was a
blunder. Bradshaw had given the Gurkha commissionsers every assurance
that a full investigation would be opened once they had surrendered the
villages; and the Calcutta government, although it claimed that he had never
been authorized to give such an impression, should have accepted the
The Gurkhas claimed that the twenty-two villages were included in the tappa or sub-department of
Rautahat, part of the Makwanpur estates which had been restored to the Nepalese in 1783 by Warren
Hastings, after having been occupied by Captain Kinloch (see below, Ch. III). Bir Krishna Singh, Raja of
Betiya, insisted that the villages were in fact in the tappa of Nanur, which had continued to form part of his
own territories after the adjustments of 1783. Summing up the findings of Mr. Young's inquiry, the
Magistrate of Saran later wrote: 'The whole of the evidence taken on both sides seems evidently to conclude
in favour of [the Raja of Betiya] as some of the witnesses on the side of the Nepalese allow that he had
possession since [1765], whilst his won witnesses unanimously give evidence to his uninterrupted possession
of upwards of forty years.' (See. Cons., 1816, no. 21)
9
16
consequences of his mistake and allowed the inquiry to proceed.
Furthermore, in asserting that the Gorkhas had rejected the findings of the
Butwal investigation, the government was anticipating Kathmandu's reaction,
but had merely asked for time to refer to the durbar, and the Raja's refusal to
evacuate the contested territory was not in fact known at Calcutta until the
end of 1813. The British were also inconsistent in their treatment of
precedents. While willing to regard their own long-effective occupation of the
twenty-two villages as 'sufficient ground, if there had been no other, for
immediately resuming them', they refused to admit similar arguments in
favour of the Gurkhas, who pleaded twenty-five years' possession of Siuraj.
But then Gurkha tactics were equally dubious. The commissioners made a
great show of indignation, and claimed that Bradshaw had deceived them,
but at the same time betrayed their own insincerity by claiming that Young's
inquiry had established their right to the village; and when Bradshaw
produced additional documents to reinforce the Company's claim, they
refused to accept them on the ground that they had not been produced at
Young's inquiry, whose findings they regarded as final.
Relations between Bradshaw and the Gurkha commissioners
deteriorated to petty bickering. At the beginning of April 1814, the latter
suddenly broke off negotiations and returned to Nepal. Bradshaw, in a
plaintive tone of self-justification, expressed his conviction that all their
previous rudeness and intransigence had been designed to provoke him into
some idiscretion which would make him appear responsible for what was in
fact a predetermined cessation. It appear that the commissioners were
summoned to Kathmandu to give their opinions in a debate which Raja was
holding to determine whether the Gurkhas should make a stand against the
British. After the Raja's refusal to evacuate Butwal and Siuraj had been
received in Calcutta in December 1813, a fresh demand, in the form of an
ultimatum, had been sent. General Amar Thapa had no intention the haughty
British, by turning against them the model soldiers he had drilled and
rehearsed with solicitude and pride, was the paramount ambition of this ailing
but ferocious old was lord. At the end of March he summoned his energies
for the journey to Kathmandu, and there used all his eloquence to urge
resistance and disparage supine concession. Opinion was divided in the
state. Bhimsen Thapa was in favour of defiance; but Brahma Shah, his
brother Hasti Dal and Amar Singh Thapa had, from the west, unanimously
counseled restraint and concession. They feared that armed resistance to the
17
British would engender full-scale war, and they knew the Gurkha state to be
too weak to embark on military enterprises of that magnitude without risking
annihilation. Urgently, they stressed the difference between the hill rajas and
the East India Company: fighting the one was like hunting deer, but engaging
in battle with the other would be like fighting tigers. The party of resistance,
however, carried their case; and General Amar Thapa, now back in Palpa,
was instructed to prepare the military defence of the territories under his
command.10 In reply to the Governor-General's protestation at the
unceremonious interruption of negotiations with Bradshaw, the Raja retorted
that Bradshaw had been rude and offensive, and that the Gurkhas had no
intention of restituting lands to which Mr. Young's inquiry had established
their incontrovertible right.
On 22 April 1814, the ultimatum for the formal surrender of Butwal and
Siuraj having expired, the Magistrate of Gorakhpur ordered seventeen
companies of native infantry to take possession. They met with no resistance,
Amar Thapa's men retreating as soon as they had arrived, because of the
malaria, and defence was entrusted to the personnel of a few thana in
Butwal. Eighteen of the Company's policeman were killed and six wounded.
The daroga (chief officer) was wounded, and surrendered. The Gurkha
commanding officer ordered him to be tied to a tree, and he was then shot
dead with arrows. Two other police posts were attacked at the same time,
and their occupants put to flight.
When the news of this atrocity reached Calcutta, early in June, the
Governor-General and Council were in conclave on normal business. The
council chamber in Fort William was not a place of harmony and relaxed cooperation. Suppressed animosity intensified the natural discomforts of the
humid Bengal summer. The Governor-General, the Marquis of Hastings,11
now in his sixtieth year, was a soldier by education and experience. As Lord
Rawdon he had fought with distinction in the American War of Independence
and then in the Revolutionary Wars in the Low Countries, where Wellignton
served under him. He was a typical soldier-bluff and unsubtle, and never at
his ease in Parliament. A disciple neither of Fox nor of Pitt, he had lacked the
The original account of this council of war is in Sec. Cons., 20 Oct. 1815, no. 54. It had been printed in
several places, including Prinsep's Political and Military Transactions, vol. I, pp. 458-60.
10
At this stage he was a fact still the Earl of Moria; but as he is better known by his later title, it is probably in
the interests of clarity to use it throughout.
11
18
personality and the political skill necessary for forming a party independent of
earned him the combined officers of Governor-General and Commander-inChief in India in 1812. The object of the dual appointment was to give
Hastings a chance to recruit his personal finances, crippled by extravagance
and ostentatious largesse; but, however financially remunerative, it cost him
much in terms of popularity. The friends of Sir George Nugent, the
Commader-in-Chief, indignantly deprecated an untimely supersession whose
only justification was the penury of the new Governor-General, and they had
used their influence to have a special post created for Nugent-that of
Commander of the Forces in Bengal.
Nugent, however, had sulked, and made up his mind to resign-much to
the annoyance of Hastings, who always fancied he could soothe ruffled
feelings. Nugent delayed his departure until December the following year,
and meantime continued as Senior Member of the Council. This meant that
Hastings was now at odds with the majority of his Council, which consisted of
two other members besides Nugent. Archibald Seton was a background
figure, occasionally asserting himself in an attempt to preserve harmony but
more often overshadowed by Neil Benjamin Edmonstone, who was openly
sympathetic towards the erstwhile Commander-in-Chief. But there were more
fundamental points of difference between Hastings and the self-assured
Edmonstone than Nugent's supersession. Edmonstone was rigidly opposed
to the style of policy pursued by Wellesley, while Hastings was resolved to
carry his work to completion. The physical contrast between Wellesley and
Hastings was extreme: the one small but naturally imposing-animated, lean,
the patrician-featured; the other large, cumbersome, and heavy-jowled-an
avuncular figure who was too native not to seem pompous when he tried to
be dignified. But they both had the same proconsular manner, love of display
and super-human energy and sense of dedication. Despite his early criticism
of Wellesley, Hastings had lately found himself increasingly in sympathy with
him, especially on the sensitive issue of Catholic emancipation, of which they
were both in favour. It was Wellesley's grand scheme of Indian alliances,
designed to obviate French subversion but left unfinished, which Hastings
resolved not only to mountcy in India. While Wellesley had striven to turn the
native states into allies, Hastings was avowedly determined to turn them into
vassals. In short, his policy was unashamedly imperialistic a term often
applied to Wellesley but perhaps better reserved for Mogul inheritance, by
19
dropping the fiction of allegiance to the puppet Emperor in Delhi and
assuming the tone and trappings of royalty itself.
It would be wrong, probably, to discount entirely love of imperialism for
its own sake; but it does seem that Hastings's policy was motivated
principally by a sincere fear that unless the British acted firs, the native states
would combine and drive the Company from India. Only paramountcy could
pre-empt destruction. This way of thinking made it impossible for Hastings to
treat the Nepalese encroachments as the symptoms of a profounder and
more insidious terpreted them as the symptoms of a profounder and more
insidious disturbance: the first stirrings of a concerted crusade among the
Hindu states, whose apotheosis would be the expulsion of all that he heard
the Political Secretary read out the dispatch from Butwal, recounting the
murder of the Company's police officer –irritation because he had never
anticipated that his efforts to resolve the Nepalese problem by diplomacy
could fail: relief, because he was beginning to suspect an alliance between
the Gurkhas and the Marathas, and considered it wiser that the Gurkhas,
obviously the better prepared, be defeated first, in isolation. But whatever
Hasting's ulterior motives may have been, his colleagues and employers
knew nothing of them, and would certainly never have condoned them if they
had. In their view, the war was designed to end the anarchy attendant on the
collapse of Mogul authority, which the Gurkhas were intent on exploiting to
the detriment of the Company's revenues and of the security of its subjects
and officers. It was, in other words, designed to turn the Company's de jure
rights into a de facto authority. No one disputed the necessity of war, least of
all Nugent, who assented almost mechanically to what he probably assumed
would be one of what he had described as 'petty warfares on the frontiers of
the British territories which rarely last more than one campaign, and which
always end successfully'. The Court of Directors was fully reconciled to the
use of force and as early as February 1814 sent a dispatch sanctioning 'a
recourse to arms for the recovery and protection of the rights of the British
Government'.
Military operations could not begin until the hot and rainy seasons had
passed. The Governor-General took advantage of the interval not only to
obtain information and make plans for the invasion, but also to require the
Raja to disavow responsibility for the murder of the daroga and punish the
culprits. He made it plain that if such atonement was not forthcoming, the two
countries would be in a state of war. This was Hastings's last measure in the
20
Nepalese crisis before his departure form Fort William on his tour of the
upper provinces. He received the Raja's reply on 12 August, while at Patna. It
evaded all mention of the fracas in Butwal, but made obscure references to
the assassination of Nepalese police officers and accused Bradshaw of
trespassing and violence. Its tone the Governor-General found 'evasive and
even implying menace'.
It is difficult to estimate how far Hastings's suspicions of collusion
between the durbar at Kathmandu and the Marathas was justified. There is
no doubt that there wee diplomatic exchanges; the Thapas had a relish for
ambassadors and the appurtenances of empire, and stationed agents at
many native courts. It was furthermore later revealed that the Peshwa of
Poona had given secret encouragement to the Gurkhas with a vague and
opportunist view to exploiting, somehow, any consequent diversion of British
energies in the hills. But the existence of mature conspiracy is unlikely. No
reference to aid expected form outside was made in the replies submitted by
the state counselors in the war debate in Kathmandu; and Amar Singh Thapa
was so far from being confident of such support that he was against at the
prospect of war. Later, when the temerity of the durbar had brought him face
to face with final defeat and ruin, he bitterly castigated the Raja for his folly at
this juncture.
His main hopes of support were directed to the Sikhs and to China,
though as the war went on he also wrote for assistance to Gwalior. His urgent
concern, as soon as the affray in Butwal be came known to him, was to avert,
if possible, British military retaliation by opening a fresh correspondence with
Ochterlony and, through him, with the Governor-General. He reiterated the
Gurkha claim to the disputed lands, made excuses for the expulsion of the
Company's thanas and repeated the offer to pay a rent for Butwal. The
ambivalent tenor of his letters betokened a struggle between appeasement
and defiance going on within him: the one prompted by his exasperation at
the durbar's foolhardiness; the other by his pride and his obstinate loyalty to
his prince, right or wrong. Unbending as far towards actual supplication as his
independent spirit would allow, he invoked the precedent of sixty years'
friendship between the two governments, and recalled his own concession in
the case of the Sirhind lowlands in a plea for agreement, he could his fierce
pride rejecting peace at the prince of humiliation, he could not resist a note of
challenge. Pointedly, he insinuated mention of Nepal's firm friendship with
21
China, and warned all potential aggressors of the military might and iron
resolve of his nation:
If . . . prompt injunctions are issued to the officers of the British Government
who are stationed on the opposite frontier of the Palpa territory to desist from
further sedition and contention, it will be proper and just, in as much as
mutual litigations will cease. Otherwise, by the favour of God, the troops of
the Gurkhas, resembling the waves of the ocean, whose chief employments
are war and hostility, will make the necessary preparations to prevent the
unsurpation of any one place which has been in their possession for years
past, and the flame of sedition will daily increase.12
To this communication the Governor-General did not see fit to reply,
and Amar Singh's subsequent attempts to negotiate through Ochterlony were
discouraged. He was asked to address himself to the Resident at Delhi; but
the long-mooted deputation of an agent there never in fact came about. Once
war had begun, the Kaji's tenders of negotiations became no more than
subterfuge, designed to distract the British and secure delays which he might
turn to military advantage.
Nepal's main diplomatic expedient was to exploit her connections with
China. As Chinese vassals, the Gurkhas were obliged to send a quinquennial
embassy to Peking, and that sent in 1813 was much publicized. The Gurkha
ambassador asked the Imperial authorities for military aid against the
Sikkimese, who, he claimed, were proving contumacious, and this was
apparently promised. It appears about the same time that the Chinese
officials in Lhasa sent money with a large escort, for the repair of a Buddhist
temple in Kathmandu. The Gurkha government then propagated the idea that
both the promise of military aid and the remittance of funds were gestures of
support against the British. Bazzar gossip in Lhasa give further currency to
such notions, and it was in this distorted from that the intelligence reached
the Company's officers in India. More likely to yield positive results in the way
of military co-operation were the negotiations opened with Bhutan in
September, 1814. The position of the Raja of Bhutan vis-à-vis the Company
was similar to that of his Gurkha neighbor, for he too had his uncomposed
border quarrels.
12
P.R.N.W., p. 70.
22
When the Governor-General announced his intention to make war, the
immediate concern of the Kathmandu durbar was to gauge his sincerity,
obtain intelligence of his preparations and delay their implementation. To this
end, it pretended to be unaware that a state of hostility existed. An envoy was
loaded with presents and sent down to Calcutta, ostensibly to submit the
Gurkha Raja's formal congratulations to the new Governor-General on his
accession and to resume negotiations concerning the frontier dispute.
Bhimsen Thapa instructed Parsuram Thapa, a suba on the frontier, to supply
escort and bearers, and urged the agent to proceed speedily. 'Delay
improper. Whatever may pass in conversation, or whatever you may observe,
hear and understand, do not write openly, but secretly and under disguise.'13
Bradshaw took advantage of the rainy months of July and August to
occupy the twenty-two villages on the Saran frontier, whence the Gurkhas
tried to dislodge him by poisoning the wells. At the end of August the first
skirmish of the war took place, with the capture of a Gurkah thana called
Kachurwa. It was therefore with some astonishment that Bradshaw learned of
the arrival at Parsuram's headquarters of a Gurkha vakil with gifts of gold,
silks, trinkets and elephants for the Governor-General. On instructions from
Headquarters he refused to allow him to proceed farther. No friendly missions
could now be received; only agents with plenary powers to sue for peace.
The vakil, called Chandra Sekhar Upadhayaya, was told that he was at liberty
to return to Kathmandu. But Chandra Sekhar ignored the intimation, but tried
surreptitiously to obtain a passport. He was unsuccessful, but still remained
on the frontier, with the ostensible design of meeting the covert purpose of
obtaining intelligence. The Gurkhas, after such a long sequence of
unimplemented threats and confident of the strength of their natural
defences, were probably still unconvinced that the Governor-General really
intended to invade Nepal. It seems that, at the most, they expected him to
seize the lands so long contested on the plains.
In Palpa, the arch-sponsor of Gurkha defiance prepared for war with
the febrile enthusiasm of the moribund. Along among men of military
experience in the state, General Amar Thapa had been flagrantly averse to
compromise. With his son, Bhimsen Thapa, determination to resist derived
more from youthful impulsiveness and vanity than from reflection and
experience. But with the General himself it was reasoned conviction which
13
P.R.N.W., p. 371.
23
urged him to canvass war. He had supreme confidence in his carefully
nurtured Palpa battalions, which were fully equal to the most brilliant corps d'
elite in Kathmandu. He conveted the influence and the prestige which would
accrue to the Gurkhas in the eyes of every native power in India if they could
but successfully resist the legendary might of the East India Company; and
he remained assured that if the worst test on their own terms, since they
could never be defeated outright in the mountains. Then, at the end of
October 1814, the old General died, having launched his country on the most
strenuous contest in its history.
Embroidered Causes
" If the Officers of the Government had hesitated to take unjustifiable risks, it
(India) would never have become a province of the British Empire.
Situation: Geo Strategic- Political
Lord Minto, the Governor General (1807-1872) had maintained a low profile
in India, especially against the Gorkhas. His consideration had been due
primarily to the fear of Napoleonic invasion of India in collusion with or
without Russia. Later Franco-Russian threat had made the British do their
worthless forays into Afghanistan and place forces in North West Frontier
Provinces- a folly they realized too late to rectify. A bigger folly was, of
course, their imagining a Franco-Nepalese alliance in India.
In 1813, the British thus far had secured six leading regions in India and
remained contended with what Minto had taken over. These included:
Mysore, Travancore, Baroda, Poona, Hyderabad and Oudh. But Gwalior,
Indore, Nagpur, resented the British efforts and began to prepare to avenge
their recent defeats. The weak and disunited Rajputs of Rajputana remained
highly vulnerable. The Rajputs' vulnerabilities emanated from their dynastic
ego and jealousy on whose account they had been nabbed one after
24
another, by the Moghuls. The pindaris lid by Chitu and Amir Khan too hated
the expanding power of the British. In Punjab, Ranjit Singh was growing
powerful, though the British had attempted to quarantine him through the
Amiratsar Treaty of 1809.
Lord Moira Who took over as Governor General and Commander-In-Chief
Indian Army in 1813 was burning with the ambition of leaving an empire for
the British and a name for himself. Fresh from the American War, he evolved
a strategy to bite more pieces of land and humble the opposition into
submission by either alliance or attrition. He wanted his name to be added to
those British who grabbed the maxium territory in India. If he could not help
retain it in America, there was a chance in India. it was thus to be his life's
opportunity.
Gorkhas, besides the Marathas and the Sikhs were regarded as the third
dangerous power the British had to contend with or defeat.
The growing Distrust
By late 1790s, the British received a surprisingly favourable situation: they
had firm control over the Indo-Gangetic Valley of the Oudh Raj, though
Marathas still had their sway over Delhi; the internal dissension in the Nepal
Durbar was creating situation for its King to abdicate in favour of his infant
son and proceed to Benaras. Here he would seek virtual security of the
British and could be exploited. The British dreams for expanding trade with
the Tartary and China over the Himanalyan regions, brightened up.14 Also,
the house of Oudh was disintegrating and the British had exploited it as a
treasure house or an alternative 'Bank of England' to meet their adhoc
financial requirements.
Tartary denoted Northern Himalayan regions of Ladakh, and Tibet. British then had poor perception of
geography. They mixed up Bhutan with Tibet and even the trade routes.
14
25
For the British, at this stage, trade, in fact, the Sine-quo-non. The trade of
East India Company to Tibet and China involved, in the west, a passage
throught the Gorkha occupied Kumaon, Garhwal, the Punjab Hill States, and
in the east through Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan. These areas were seen as
essential trade-corridors.15 In his efforts for trade, Warren Hastings had to
infiltrate Bogle to Tibet in 1774 to explore the best possibility. The trading
centres in Tibet were at Yatung, Lhasa, Shigatse, Gartok and Leh, in Ladakh,
The traders of the Company knew fo " The great commerce which naturally
ought to exist and which formerly did subsist between the vast Cis and TransHimalayan Regions."16 Territorial possessions, willy-nilly, was becoming
essential by the British, for which Moira saw an overall favorable situation
under development.
A ray of hove really signaled from within Nepal and it was no less than, as we
said earlier, a frustrated King Rana Bahadur Shah in abdication, who was
prepared to succumb to means and machinations that could regain his throne
at Kathmandu, once again. And he did what the Afghan Kings ofter did. He
signed a parallel treaty called " TREATY WITH RAJA OF NEPAL- 1801
BETWEEN MAHARAJA AND THE MOST NOBLE GOVERNOR GENERAL
MARQUIS WELLESIEY".17 Such fraudulent a document it was that it raised
shock waves in the Durbar. Fearing not only the demise of the Raja, the
Durbar, under duress agreed to sign a similar treaty something like the treaty
of 1792-93 which Kirkpatrick promoted.
Trade with Tibet and China was thought to be best provided through the
Gorkha territories. although it later proved without adequate foundation. The
Durbar saw the British efforts leading nothing but to colonization. With the
characteristic British penchant for intrigues, subversion and embroidering
threats, such as threat from China, the Franco-Russian threat, these, were
15PRNW
16
PP 65; Pemble PP86-87
Selection From Records of Government of Bengal XVII pp 12.
Document on Treaties, Engagements & Sannads, Number XXIV. Rana Bahadur hob nobbed with the
British to have himself 'reinstated to the throne'.
17
26
hoped to provide better modus vivendi for trade. But the Nepalese trusted
neither the British intentions nor encouraged their overtures.
Then followed Knox's18 much debated and much hated mission to Nepal as
agent of the Governor General at Kathmandu. Knox's was, undoubtedly an
undesirable mission. And little wonder that he was made to vacate the office
within one year. The fundamental cause of war that followed had, in fact, its
roots in the failed Knox mission. In 1767 a similar, though more hostile,
mission of going to the aid Malla Raja by Kinloch, had already sowed
sufficient seed of hatred and distrust for the Firingis amongst the Gorkhas.
Vansittart recorded the Nepalese feelings that prevailed then: "Regarding
throwing open the country to the Europeans, the Gorkhas have a saying with
the merchants come the musket and with the Bible comes the Bayonet. They
have always shown greatest objection to admitting any European into Nepal
and they seem to consider that, were they to relax this rule, their
independence, of which they are extremely proud, would shortly be lost".19
The Gorkha repugnance to call Europeans to Nepal was both from fear of
their swamping the Nepalese trade and resorting to anti-national-tricks. It
was, however only in 1800s that situation deteriorated. Kirkpatrick had noted.
" Notwithstanding the narrow spirit which directs the commercial concern of
this people the government affords on the whole, considerable protection to
foreign merchants." 20 He also remarked that the standard gold coin was 2
percent inferior to the Calcutta Mohr. The British began looking for shawl
wool from Ladakh nad its being knitted by the Kashmiri weavers. Bogle and
Moorcroft, as we saw, were sent for acousting the market and bringing the
samples. The Sikhs of Ranjit Singh also were carrying out similar trade at the
time.
18
Hasrat PP 208-209.
19
Hand Book for Indian Army:Gurkha (1915) PP 42.
20
Kirkpatrick PP 204; Pol Con Sep 21,1795, No 24.
27
Such fears-which prevailed-then saw Capuchin (Italian) missionaries being
evicted out of Nepal as from Tibet. The repugnance that spread among the
Nepalese for the Europeans resulted in the British image turning as tyrants
and the biggest violators of human rights. For the Nepalese' three Ks,
Kinloch Kirkpatrick and Knox, became the symbols of the British threat of
Nepal.21 And events that followed, created ruptures irreparably.
The Economic Causes
The economic cause constituted the major cause of conflict with Nepal. The
Treaty of Commerce was akin to the present from of GATT- General
Agreement of Tariffs and Trades. The British made constant efforts to
persuade the Nepalese government to allow them their trade through Nepal
and through the Indian territories in their occupation. Form Kirkpatrick, the y
moved to Maulvi Abdul Qader (1795) and later Knox (1801), but the
Nepalese Durbar refused to budge an inch.
Added to the list of causes came the land-grab avarice, which brought the
Gorkhas into India and which became the ambition of the British, as they saw
a golden land laid before them. David Ochterlony, then an agent at Ludhiana
grudgingly noted in 1811 his views on the Gorkha territorial control:" They are
now in undisputed possession of the whole country from the Jamuna to
Sultaj, extending to the north to the dependencies of the Empire of China with
the exception of Kinnaur which the Raja of BAsahar had been allowed to
retain."22 On 24 August 1814, he for example, noted of Dehra Dun as a "
potentially thriving entrepot for Trabs-Himalayan trade". and contemplated
annexing Garhwal not so much with the view to revenue but for security of
On threee 'ks": Moira's secret letter of 11 May 1815 addressed to Board to Directors said: " ..one of the
objects of dispute which has given rise to war owes its remote origin to the consequences of Kinloch
expedition, and the ulterior objectives of Kirkpatrick and Knox's missions were defeated by enemity and
jealousy of party .. and its obstinacy presents only obstacles to pacification." See letter reproduced in Hasrat
PP 149.
21
Ludhina Agency Records Vol II PP 395; PRNW PP 65. Pemble PP 85. Problem with China assumed
frictitious shape when Chinese bagan to see British expansion in India as threat to Tibet. The Nepalese
troops in European uniform were also seen by the Chinese as the British troops in Nepal.
22
28
commercial communications with the country where the shawl wool is
produced. Soon they got to know that Kumaon provided batter facility for
trade with Tibet- China. Therefore, the annexation of these two areas
became part of their strategic objectives. Out of such necessity for trade and
its security, the British historians also saw the need for "preserving the moral
nad physical energies of the parent country (through) the bales and
mountains of the Indian Alps."23
While trade, indeed, was the major objective of the company, out of its, grew
a concept of 'political safety', which ipso-facto meant a strategy of dissuasion
and larger areas of occupation.
That, it was a flawed strategy is explained by PJ Marshal:24 "Political safety
meant military preparedness. The military expenditure for 1761-62 to 1770-71
was 44 percent of the total spending of 22 million pounds. War and
diplomacy rater than trade and improvement…most of the soldiers-would-be
politicians and Governor Generals rarely understood. The political safety of
Bengal was their first priority and they interpreted safety as requiring the
subjugation of Mysore, the Marahas the Pindaris, Nepal and the Burmese".
This flawed perception, thus became the second major cause for the war.
The China Factor
The China factor also built up. The Nepleese had placated it as part of their
psychological canard that a treaty alliance existed with China after the 1792
war. So effective was the Nepalese demonstration that the British also began
to regard Nepal as vassal of China and that, an attack on Nepal would
23
History of Birtish India, VOL VIII by Mill PP 59-60.
In the New Cambridge History of India-Vol 2 : Bengal The British Bridgehed Eastern India (1740-1828)
Orient Longman 1987.
24
29
provoke China, Which it could ill-afford. Walter Hamilton records that in 1802
when Gott was deputed by Wellesly to examine the forest of Kumaon, the
Gorkha commander expressed great apprehension as his arrival would be
seen a provocation. He told him that the Emperor of China had threatened to
depose the Raja of Nepal if he permitted the Europeans to explore his
country. Whether deliberately planted or not, the British seemed to bite at the
bait.25
This impression lingered on. But over a period of time as situation developed
and intelligence improved, the British began to take limited risks in dealing
with the Nepalese – Chinese friendship or alliance. Its best example is seen (
and we perforce jump the gun) in the directive that was given to General
Marley, tasked to advance to Kathmandu in 1814-15. He was directed to
inform the Chinese, if confronted, that "the British objective of operations was
only punitive and not acquisitive."26 It is historically surmised that though the
Knox mission was the great political affrontary of the time and that
Kathmandu Durbar was in tatters, the British impulse to invade Nepal earlier,
was prevented, to a large extent, by this imagined Nepalese-Chinese
alliance.
The Territorial Disputes
The territorial disputes also built up to augment the hostility, anguish and
vendetta:
 Kheri, Sheoraj, Butwal.
 22 villages near Rautehat- Jaunpur.
 Bhim Nagar in Morung.
Water Hamilton PP 103. Perhaps there is partial truth in it as form 1792 the Nepalese were obliged by the
treaty to send 'quinquennial embassy' or tribute to China. But Nepal was never the vassal of China nor under
its suzerainty.
25
26
Pol Con 14 Sep 1816 No. 43; Pemble PP 79
30
 Villages near Pinjore.27
In these cases neither the Gorkhas nor the British could put up convincing
cases of defence or legitimacy, and enquiries made by Young, Ochterlony
and Bradshaw made no headway. The Gorkhas stuck obdurately to Sheoraj
and Butwal, which though part of Palpa-Tansen, were contested by the
British to be part of Oudh under their protection. So erroneous had been the
impression that late historians like J Talboy Wheeler called it, " gradual
absorption of the British territories by the Gorkhas." In consonance with this
thinking even political agents like William Fraser observed: "This power
emboldened by a long course of success nad conquest had commenced a
deliberate course of insult towards its (British) lower ministers which at length
became absolutely necessary to Nepal."28
A case that then developed was one of the two robbers having plundered a
house, use morally viable adjectives in their own defence and justification.
The British usage of the Gorkha claims as "Inadmissible", and their ambitions
as "insatiable thirst or ambition and limited power" , fitted into this theme. And
the Gorkhas calling for an alliance with the Indiana states to throw the Firingis
out, was no less.29
Moira, in his report to the Directors had described it as " Gorkha passion for
war" and added that they " had an overwhelming opinion of themselves, so
inaccurate were their notions of our resource."30 However, BD sanwal felt that
" reasonable points in favour of the Nepalse government were kept aside
and unnecessary emphasis was laid on the genuineness."31 Panderal Mooon
Ludhiana Records PP 197. The final excuse built up when 18 Policemen were killed in a Gorkha raid in a
place below Palpa on May 18, 1814 . It provided the ultimate excuse of war to Moira, who was regarded as
'anxious to display his military talents'.
27
28
Wheeler PP 472 and Fraser pp 3.
29
Ludhiana Records PP 394-395.
30
Hasrat reproduced at PP 257,
31
BD Sanwal pp 133-141.
31
was convinced that "the British claims were not in all cases indisputable."
They, were, is fact, untenable.32
The root cause- even if an auxiliary root-of war between the Company and
Nepal as Forbes said was due to the desire of the Barons of Nepal to extend
their sway over the Zamindars; and, irrespective of what the British pipers
might tell of the glory in the filed, it was the shareholder in London and Courts
of Kathmandu that called the tune.33 The both set of the people were hellbent to exercise their own so called rights.
The White Man's Superiority: A Psyche of 'Super-race'
There is an innate psychological urge among men and women- and also in
races- to dominate the others. It has taken forms of colour, caste, creed
religion, ethnicity and so on. The Jewish diaspora, the Aryan migration, the
Europisation of the two Americas and Australia are some of the examples. In
the 19th Century, Europe gave this expression through trade and colonization
by white races, then regarded as superior to the natives. Its effect, though
not marked, nor admitted, needs to be seen in the context of Anglo- Gorkha
War. Major General Rollo Gillespie saw the Gorkha challenge to the British
supremacy as "Opinion is everything in such a country as India: and
whenever the natives shall begin to lose their reverence for the English arms,
our superiority in other respects will quickly sink into contempt.
Forebeareance under repeated insults committed by those lawless
marauders who acknowledge no law ! But their convenience unavoidably
would hanve brought our national character into disrepute among the various
nations to the east." It was this assumption of psychology of colonization that
served the British rule. Most of the m tried to establish that this was not to be
true. And a new twist as even the annexation of India by the British in the
words of JH Batten (in 1815 official Report on the Province of Kemaon)
opined that ".. finally peace and plenty would smile on the very plains invited
32
Moon, Penderal PP 378 note-8.
33
Forbes PP 346-47.
32
to the land neither by Mohemmedans nor Hindus but by the Christians of a
Western Atlantic Islands."
From this rose another need- the character and leadership in the Indians to
defend themselves which the British found lacking. Sir Thomas Munro,
Governor of Madras said of it in1824: " It we pursue steadily in proper
measures we shall in time so far improve he character of Indian subjects to
enable them to protect themselves. "This very feeling continued as Filed
Marshal Roberts C-in-C 1885-93 reflected: "Native officers and Eastern races
however brave and accustomed to war do not possess qualities that make
good leaders of men." Such views also led to the hatred for the Eurasians or
the Anglo-Indians.
One thing about history is that while its larger cycles might be repeating
themselves but they constantly discard and disprove hurriedly formed human
theories. By 1945, it became clear that bravery was not the pre-serve of
Whiteman lesser still of the self-styled martial people. The Gorkhas dicidedly
broke this myth in the Anglo-Gorkha war. The fallibility of the British soldiers
and arms was so distinctly prominent that in the wrds of "Edward Bishop as
"recently as 1929 military historians avoiding the issue commented that the
questions of Moira's columns redounded so little to our credit."34 But such
complexion-oriented complexes then had deeper roots.
Envy also became the cause of clash with the Gorkhas. They were called "
unpyincipled horde" and those who falsely " struck awe among various
states." childish, it might appear, but it was true. The final cause was built by
the May 18, 1814 incident in which a post below palpa was overrun by the
Gorkhas. It hadeen worked out as the ultimate overt excuse by the British. It
provided what Edward Thornton remarked as providing "anxious display of
the Governor General's military talents."35 Then no amount of pleadings for
sanity could prevent the British from entering into war. The Gorkhas had even
Memoirs of Gillespie; Psychology of Colonization by Mannoni and Calibar; Theory of Social Change by
Honewood.
34
35
The Story of Gurkha, Bishop, PP 11.
33
offered to hand over the disputed villages to the British, if that was what could
end the dispute and the war.
Failure of Diplomacy
Failure of diplomacy emerges as another cause. The main characters were,
a brusque and ambitionus- Moira on the one hand and an inexperienced,
though intelligent and patriotic Bhim Sen Thapa, as Prime Minister of Nepal,
on the other. Moira had been prejudiced and jaundiced by people like Paris
Bradshaw who saw the world being divided between the British virtue and
others' vices. Then there was Ochterlony who suggested " to repel the
present and prevent future aggression it will always be necessary to convince
Amar Singh that his hills are not to us inaccessible and his forts
impregnable."36
Despite entreaties from Bam Shah, Amar Singh and others, Bhim Sen Thapa
also obdurately stuck to his stance, which though not very conciliatory, was
dignified. The Gorkhas did every thing to prevent the war form breaking out
which even Penderal Moon observed: " They had no desire for war
themselves but were unwilling to be intimidated; and remembering how the
British had been repulsed at Bharatpur, hoped to put up successful
resistance in the mountain-fastnes."37 But Moira still chose to call it as the
Gorkha passion for war. And to add to it, Ochterloney beefed up Moira's
obsession by writing back to him: "The expulsion of the Gorkha power from
the country between the Sutlaj and Jumna is a necessary measure against
the government of Nepal." Among others who advised Moira-but were over –
ruled against the war was H St J Tucker, Wellesley's old financial adviser
who deplored the risk by saying: "What an opportunity for the Marathas, while
we are knocking our heads against those mountain."38
36
See Edward Thorntons. The History of the British Empire In India Vol IV, PP 336.
37
Stiller The Rise of The House of Gorkha pp 332; and Ochterlony's letter of 13 July 1813,
38
Moon PP 378.
34
Self over-Estimation
Over estimation of personal capabilities both by the Gorkhas and the British
served as a good cause for the war. The Gorkhas, saw the British failures at
Bharatpur (1805), the deceit adopted by the British to defeat and kill Tipu
Sultan (1799), as examples of their moral bankruptcy, as against their own
strength. This strength also emerged from the undue potential being given to
the mountains that geographically defended Nepal from India. Bhim Sen
Thapa declared: "The Chinese once made war to seek peace. How will the
English be able to penetrate into our hills ? We shall on our exertions be able
to oppose … our hills and fastness are work of God and are impregnable" 39
To that Moira added that the Gorkhas had inaccurate notions of his
resources. It became a case of intimidation and muscle flexing.
Cause Summed Up
The basic cause for war was thus a greed to grab territory and power both by
the Company and the rising Gorkha power. The Company needed it for trade
and prosperity and the Gorkhas for power and sustenance. Both had found
the Indian states weak and subservient. Therefore, there could not be any
better situation for both of them of claim and counter-claim their so called
rights to fight.
What added to the British belief that the Gorkhas were 'conquerable'? is the
bigger question of the war. For, unless the vulnerability of na enemy is
known, a state of deterrence is forced to maintain. It is only after own
superiority is well established that a recourse to war is adopted. The
capability of an adversary is estimated on what Duke of Wellington called:
'One's ability to see the other side of the hill.40 The British intelligence, even
by standard of those times, was superb. They had also hoped that their old
39
Ibid PP 378.
Gorkha. A History of Gurkhas, Tuker PP 78. Also see Pol Cons April 22, 1814, No. 43. Para 10; Prinsep
465-66.
40
35
stratagem of subversion would succeed if their military prowess failed. The
instrument of propaganda too was expected to yield results.
Subversion tactics played a considerable part in this war both at preliminary
stage and during the war. The British had made it a fine art of conquering not
only the Gorkhas but all of India. In that they always targets. They repeatedly
offered the temptations of Jagir to Amar Singh and pensions to others. To
Bam Shah, their offers ranged from Governorship of Province of Doti to all
other temptations. Though there were signals, albeit, wrong to and from Bam
Shah, it was absolutely certain that he never bargained his loyalty to the
British offers.41 In the list of subversions, every British official made deliberate
attempt to either win over the Gorkhas or black-mail them. Part of this
technique did succeed when fighting broke out.
The British ability to create cleft among the already divided Indian states and
the non-existent Asian solidarity was another aspect. They hoped they will be
able to effectively employ them in achieving their strategic aims. Through a
'Proclamation' they had offered adequate temptations to the rulers to restore
their states to them . Similar gestures were made to some of the Gorkhas
commanders who, in their view, were 'malcontent and dissatisfied' with
Kathmandu. All this had also been fed to them though their adventurous lots
such as Moorcroft and others.42
41
Generals & Strategists by the author. PP 16.
42
PRNW PP 73, 142, 144-45, 207, 344, 711-712.
36
Organisations and Tactics that Made Fighting Possible
The Gorkhas
The Regmi Papers place the strength of the Gorkha Army as 18,000 in AD
1800 which had mobilisational capability of 40,000. He lists out four
battalions-Kalidaksh, suboorj (?), Sriath and Gorkh-and 36 companies, which
were on the orbat of the army at Kathmandu. It is at variance with other
records which show:
 The strength of the force that took part in invasion of Kumaon-Garhwal
in 1790-91 was companies.43
 The British intelligence estimated the Gorkhas having 31 companies in
1805 with a strength of 8,040 which progressively increased to 10,000
in 1815 and 12,000 in 1819. They also accepted a mobilisational
capability of Nepal at 57,000. This, obviously was the result of the
Pajani system. Hamilton, more accurately, estimated the Gorkha
strength in 1802 as 65 companies.
The Gorkha sources themselves have been confusing and mixed up as no
credible records seem to have been maintained. Assuming Hamilton's
information near accurate, it becomes clear that in 1814 the Gorkhas were
upward of 65 companies which increased during the war to almost 120
companies . The assessment of the strength of the strength of the Gorkhas
for the Anglo- Gorkha War was estimated at 12,000 lightly armed men whose
deployment was appreciated as : West of Jamuna – 4,000; between Jamuna
and Kali 2,000; East of Kali-6,000. Each of the Gurkha battalion was 600
strong with flint-locked rifles and their firing standards were good; they had
300 artillery pieces of 3-4 pounders mostly carried menslung .
See Lieutenant Colonel Spaigt's Article Gorkha Expansion; M Scots report of 27 Dec 1814. The original
Gorkha Battalions were Hanumandal. Singh Nath and Sri Nath. Also wee Sainik Itihas.
43
37
While the tactical unit remained a company, the four battalions we mentioned
were, in fact, ceremonial organizations, which were raised by General Amar
Singh Thapa, the father of Bhim Sen Thapa, at Tansen Palpa and
Kathmandu. These were experimental battalions, which Thapa raised to
counter the growing British mance. He would later claim them to have
achieved standards better than the British's .
The overall command and control system of the Gorkhas was based on their
own and traditional system of commanders, which was partly monarchial and
partly open to aristocracies and commoners. A credible effort to modernize
their army. A Chautaria comprising the blood brothers of the Prince Regent or
the King represented the monarchy. A subba and Kazi, for example, were
both a judge, a Police officer and revenue collector, besides being a military
commander. A Bhandar found a part of the twelve to fifteen-men-council.
The team could be assigned military powers, if required. While a company
was normally commanded by a Subedar, it was not uncommon to find a
Captain to command either one unit or a number of units placed in a fort.
Both Captain and Subedar represented the military leaders from the
commoners.
A company had a norma strength of 160 with four Jamadars, one Major,
equivalent to Havilder/Sergeant Major Adjutant, Kotiya (Quarter-Master) and
the ranks and file. It also had a small band with local musical instruments.
The artesens like blacksmith were also included. A company could then look
like what is shown below.
Rank
Number
Fields
Total Fields
Khuwa
(Salary)
Subedar
1
11
11
Rs 400
Jemadars
4
6
24
220
Major
1
4
4
25
38
Adjutant
1
4
4
25
Kotiya (QM)
1
4
4
25
Rank & File
103
Band
9
Non
Combatants
44
Entolled
Notes
1.
2.
3.
The Indian Currency and Nepalese currency were at variance even
Then 400 Indian Rupees were equivalent to 700 Nepalese Rupees.
A Subedar was allotted 15 fields with yield of 100 muris (20
mounds). A Jemadar was allotted 7 fields.
A company had 3-4 Platoons, which could fight independently.
The family tree was :
Company Headquarters
Fighting Platoons (3)
Band Platoon (1)
Except the four battalions which were organized and dressed on the
European lines, the other troops were dressed more informally than what are
more authentically shown in the India Revealed: The Arts and Adventures of
James and William Fraser 1801-35. They carried a flag of yellow cloth with a
Hanuman in black, embroidered on it. 44
William Fraser, Though a political agent, was an adventurer who helped raise an Irregular battalion under
Martindell which provided very useful manpower for the eventual raising of the Gorkhas. Fraser's opinion of
44
39
Bhim Sen Thapa was a far seeing man who saw the threat, to the areas of
occupation and Nepal developing from the British. He visualized a deliberate
militarization of Nepal and the occupied territories as the only solution to
effectively contain their influence. The financial constraints, no doubt, could
not improve or match their capability with the British; and they, therefore,
remained what Hearsey wrote to Moira in 1813: "Their musketeers are
infamous and their gun powder the same … flints are bad; they have little or
no clothing and are very ill paid." This is further substantiated by Moira's
report of June 1815 after the first Campaign .. "The Gorkha force was most
part armed, clothed and disciplined in the imitation of our Sepoys". This was
obviously tutored and manipulated and highly incorrect. However, his praise
of the Gorkhas was true. The soldiers were known to be courageous, active,
robust, obedient and patient under great privations as well as intelligent and
quick of apprehensions. IN an earlier report he assessed the Gorkhas
differently, as he wrote : "Although weak in military skill, their men are towers
of strength. Their officers spirited."45
The great Achilles heel of the Gorkhas was their logistics and aritillery. we
have devoted adequate to them else where. The main characteristics of the
Gorkha organizations lay in their being lightly armed, unencumbered by
heavey weapons or equipment. A portion of their strength carried flintlocked
muskets which provided lesser and often inaccurate fire. But their riflemen
were known to be veryfine marksmen, who influenced the battle at critical
moments by bringing down the key British appointments including their
assaulting Generals. Their artillery was as great a hindrance as their logistics.
Equipped with small calibred guns from 1.5 inch to 4 inchs, they could at best
be used as antipersonal weapos.Their ability to batter a fort or emplacement
was minimal. And it was this deficiency inter-alia that caused failures at
Langurgarhi and Kot Kangra.
Gorkhas is worthwhile to quote: The Goorkhalis are a famous superior race in size and discipline and
determination. They are said to run a steep acclivity …..
See PRNW pp 258, The author of The History of the Bengal Artillery notes at PP2 the Gorkhali words of
commands in French and their dress, being British. It showed the Gorkha keenness to imbibe the changes.
45
40
What remarkable actually were the Gorkha ability to sense the direction of
attack, produce integrated fire at the attacker with deliberate and coordinated
fire control.It is this fire control and the critical lethality of their weapons
(muskets,bow and arrows, use of missiles, panjis of browned bamboos and
use of ground ), which made them formidable defenders. Combined with
these were the sudden spoiling attacks with khukris, which bloodied the
British and often routed their assaulting columns.
To Gorkhas, women were both wives and mothers as also fighters. some of
them moved about dressed as men. The local women also joined them in
fighting. besides nursing the wounded and the dying, they built walls,
collected stones to be thrown as missiles. perhaps the first example of
women joining the men in fighting a modern enemy is found in this war.
speaking of the women's role at the battle of Kalunga,Kennedy, vansitart
and fraser wrote of the Gokha women's valour; "During the assaults on the
fort women were seen hurling stones and undauntly exposing themselves;
and several of their dead bodies and 4 wounded were subsequently found
amidst ruins of the fort".
Tactics are influenced primarily by the terrain one operates and fights in, the
type of the enemy, and his techniques of fighting. The Gorkhas developed
both defensive and offensive tactics. IN defence they followed principally the
system of covering the rotes of movement of an enemy. They built forts;
stockades provided depth to forts by throwing out a part of their strength in
early warning role.
The defenses they occupied showed tactical brilliance. Their forts dominated
all approaches and had layered perimeters of defenses. To protect
themselves they created foxholes into which they moved when the main fort
was heavily shelled. Their strong bunkers looked like dog-kennels to the
British but they saved them form effects of shell. The Mongoloid looks of the
Gorkhas scared the softer British officers and tightly uniformed sepoys. Their
use of Panjis was as skilful as their use of internal moats.
41
In attack they divided themselves in columns often mutually unsupported.
They fought close quarter battles where skirmish was the rule rather than
exception. Their best examples of attack against the British were at Jaithak
(Major Richard's Ludlow's Force) and at Parsa and Samanpur. The above
tow examples are reproduced partly, in the illustrations.
The Gorkha had developed a sixth sense for fighting both the defensive and
offensive operations. With an uncanny eye for ground they compensated
their deficiency in modern arms specially artillery with bravery combined with
improvisation. Their natural hardihood enabled them to suffer privations
uncomplainingly, turning the same as an enormous instrument of advantage
to their meager logistics. In recent times only the Vietnamese of Ho Chi Minh
compared with them in hardihood, improvisation and determination. And they
proved, they were the best in the world.
The British Organisation and Tactics
The British have been a sea-faring and fighting nation. That was the tune all
Europe played. They were quick to learn lessons of failures from the
American War (1812-14) as also successes elsewhere. But the larger
lessons of tactics and understanding of strategy came to them from
Continental wars they fought and the introduction in 1803-1805 of a Light
Brigade by Sir John Moore. Earlier, important changes had taken place in the
organization in 1796. Certain improvements in tactical drills had been brought
about by Colonel David Dundas who advocated the Infantry drills in extended
formations. Juibert give them the tactical idea of fire and movement and thus
introduced the application of tactics, on a sounder footing.
As a result of organizational changes, the command, control and logistics of
the field formations was also separated from policy planning. Of relevance to
us is the allocation of threee battalions of artillery along with lascars (or
Lascars) to the Bengal Army and European Infantry battalions (HM's Infantry)
and Four regular battalions of Indian (Native) Cavalry. It was here that the
42
single infantry battalion regiments were formed into two battalion regiments of
which the Bangal Army had twelve. Each European Artillery had three
battalions of five companies; the European Infantry each of the three
regiments had ten companies; the Regular Native Cavalry had four regiments
of six troops each and Native Infantry had 12 regiments of two battalions
each. Every Native Infantry regiment had an establishment of 45 British
officers, 2 British Sergeants, 40 Native officers, 200 NCOs, 40 Drummers and
Fifers and 1600 Sepoys. The native battalion had two Grenadiers companies
46
One Light company and Seven Battalion companies. The battalion staff of
the Native Infantry included Adjutant, Quartermaster and Regimental
Sergeant Major and Quarter Master Sergeant, as the Senior NCOs. The
European Artillery battalion had five companies each and mounted Rocket
Artillery Troop. The Native Artillery had four troops and its officer
commanding was a Major. The Corps of Pioneers had eight companies
integral of the Bengal Army. Local Battalions, which were irregular battalions
were also raised. Of interest were the Eastern (Rangpur) and local Battalions
at, Ramgarh, Mizapur Champaran; Local Infantry Provincial Battalions at
Burdwan, Chittagong, Dhaka, Murshidabad, Patna, Purea. The Hill Rangers
were at Bhagalpur. Two Light Battalions were also available under command
of Majors with 12 more officers and two Ensigns. They were designed to work
as outflanking columns . The First battalion worked with Martindell's Division
and the Second with Ochtetrlony's. Irregular Cavalry under J skinner and
Gardner were located at Hansi and Khasganj. An Impressive Organisation by
all Accounts. This organization was flexible and gave them the necessary
punch. Brigades and divisions were formed out of the operational needs and
their grouping was flexible. But the staff was milked from the units and in the
absence of dedicated staff and permanent headquarters, command
deficiency became evident as the war progressed. The officers picked up for
ad-hoc headquarters were junior officers who could not influence the
operational decisions of their commanders.
Expansion of the Bengal Army took place form 1814 when the strength of the
Native Infantry regiments moved up to 30 and later two more were added.
During the period, the HM's regiments were 8th (King's Royal Irish) Light
46
Gorkha history by Vansitart, Fraser and Kennedy saw them fighting at Kalunga.
43
Dragoons, 24th Regiment of Light Dragoons, 14th, 17th , 53rd, 67th, 69th and
78th Regiments of the Foot.
The Concept of Irregulars-Mercenaries
The Europeans learnt that all regulars could not make up the requirement of
troops. Besides, the regulars were expensive to train and maintain. The
British caught on this idea of creating Irregulars from 1793-much later than
the pajani system in Nepal. A Corps of Uhlans was the result. Such Irregulars
could be equipped with Fusils rather than expensive Muskets.47 The
Irregulars could be under the battle field control, and their light companies
could be attached to be the regular battalions. Irregulars drew foreign
emigrants, prisoners wanting to see adventure venture and deserters seeking
clemency besides those who could plunder in uniform. Irregulars were
created both by the Gorkhas (Rohillas, local men of occupied areas) and by
the British. So comprising the riff-raffs they had on both sides Sikhs, Rohillas,
Pindaris- any one, every one looking for quick money and adventure. It is
right to say their deaths were as mysterious as their births. Their loyalties too
varied according to the circumstance of success or the volume of plunder.
Some Anglo Indian Soldiers of fortune like Hearsey, Gradner, Skinner,
Hosdson Walter Reinhardt, Benoit La Borgne, Martine, Birch et at, took to
raising these Irregulars, who through training, loyalty and camaraderie
induced a very high sense of sacrifice in some of them. They, later were to
become as effective units as the regulars. The Rangpur Irregular Battalion
did extremely well in its operations under Captain Barre Latter, during the
Anglo-Gorkha War. So did the Irregulars under Gardner, Nicolls and Ross.
In Europe, the Irregulars Cavalry were called as chasseurs-a-Cheval, and the
Infantry as Fusiliers (or Fusiliers).48
Grenadier Company consisted of soldiers of exceptionally good height who could carry more weight and
fight longer. They carried about 60 pound weight of arms and ammunition, especially Grenades.
47
48
44
British Leadership before War
This book endeavors to examine the leadership aspect later in reasonable
details. Though their analysis is aptly done in the campaign specifically,
however, certain knowledge on the British leadership of that time becomes
necessary, even at this stage. Their leadership was generally poor, which
affected not only operational efficiency of the units and formation but also the
essential camaraderie between the Europeans and the Indians. As the
British began to achieve results of consolidation, the discrimination of white
men for the Indians grew. Such overtures were counter-productive to
cohesiveness in units and coherence in the Army. The Commanders- in –
Chief became responsible to bring about this degeneration which constantly
reflected on the results achieved by the British whenever they faced stiff
opposition, such as at Bharatpur (1805) and the Gorkha War. The old officers
attributed this to lack of rapport between the senior and the junior British
officers. One of the officers lamented in the Select Committee proceedings
when he wrote; " Almost everyone in the Madras Army can talk of Lawrence,
Clive or Coote but not one in a thousand can say who the C-in-C was."
This leadership was equally bad in the European units. John Pemble and
Byron Farwell have poor opinion of them simply. They consider them as
"wretched in quality".49 The Service conditions were equllly responsible for
this rotten quality, where a soldier in the Company's service and the officers
lingered on their ranks for unduly long period. It took an Ensign to become a
Lieutenant six years; a Lieutenant to Captain, fifteen years; Captain to Major,
twelve years; Major to Lieutenant Colonel, six years; from Lieutenant to
Colonel, thirteen years. Thus it took 52 years for an Ensign to be a Colonel. It
is no wonder that all their officers were old when they fought the War. Some
of them had even gone infirm and senile, especially at the higher level of
command.
The age or overage was not the only factor that affected efficiency but also
the poor pay that the junior officers got. By 1809 the British officers caused
49
45
White Mutiny,50 the cause of which was the abolition of the tent contract, by
Sir George Barlow, the Governor of Madras, where these officers ofter made
hefty profits through Hawalas.
The moral side of the British conduct also effected the quality of the officers'
leadership. Prizes and plundered at money became a distinct feature of any
operation. For example, the wealth plundered at Tipu Sultan's palce at
Seringpatam in 1799 was estimated at more than two million pounds which
was given as prize money. The same have been the cases everywhere.
Commenting on this aspect, Colonel Ferryman wrote: "Reference to prize
money and plunder added zest to the soldiers' live .It was quiet in order and
regulated by the government. However, private plunder, though carried out,
were regarded as relic of barbarism and genrally denounced but was openly
winked at."51
British Tactics52
Tactics is derived from Greek word Taktoc meaning distribution of thisgs
arranged mechanically but as part of higher principles of war. This ill defined
word has naturally undergone change over a period of time and now
connotes the deployment of troops against the enemy with a view to defeat
him. It takes into account the ground, the fire support and the manoeuvre. In
Eurpoe, the British were exposed to war of movements and attrition but in
India it turned out to be luxury, laxity and a boastful sense of superiority over
the natives who failed to stand up to the British show of military power and
invariably succumbed to subversion and intimidation. Little wonder, Kazi
Amar Singh remarked in his 2 March 1815 letter that thus far the British had
not been seriously opposed by any one in India. Notwithstanding the
condition in India, the British had followed the tactics of skirmish and
battering. The former was carried out by the Infantry and Cavalry, the latter
50
51
52
46
was done by Artillery.53 David Dundas, as mentioned earlier, had evolved
drills for close column and a system of echeloning involving two basic fighting
units and Infantry battalion normally of eight companies and a horse cavalry
regiment. The successful conclusion of a battle was to be achieved by a
integrated volume of fire. This very tactics was adapted by the Indian units in
form of attack being developed on the firing line and Reserve. The Firing Line
again divided itself into skirmishers and supporters. This is illustrated.
This tactics failed to a large extent in the Anglo-Gorkha War. It had to be
repeatedly modified, as we will see in the campaign studies.
Strategic Imperatives
British
By 1814 Moira's aims had been crystallized as three folds: show a big victory
against the Gorkhas so as to indirectly convey the message of British
Supremacy in India; to clear a trade corridor in the territories occupied by the
Gorkhas; and, to build his own image as consolidator of the British gains in
India. The victory against the Gorkhas was to act as a spring-board for
compaign against the Marathas and probably against Ranjit Singh, beside
improving trade in the north.
Some historians, such as Majumdar had described Moira's objective as ' to
impose a limit on the military expansion of the Nepalese.'54 That does not
stand the scrutiny of history. For, if it were so, all that Moira should have done
was to capture Sheoraj and Butwal, combined with other insignificant
enclaves of dispute. But for Moira the larger issue was trade and the corridor
53
54
47
for its expansion to north. His aim, therefore, was: to defeat the Gorkhas in
the areas of occupation including Sikkim and impose such terms on them as
suited the British interest; and to chastise and humiliate the Durbar through
military defeats on them. In concept, therefore, Moira's strategy was to
capture territories and impose British will on the Nepalese.
Of this larger strategic aim, emerged the military strategy and the doctrine.
The choice of the areas were focused on the corridor for trade, the Valleyrs
of Dun and Kyarda Dun. Further, adequate show of force was to be made
against the Kathamandu Valley. And while the military operations were
ensuing, the probable allies of the Gorkhas had to be weaned away and
rebellions had to be caused in the hinter-land to the Gorkha occupied areas.
It could be aided by the Rulers whose states were in possession of Gorkhas
and so no. On the question of campaigning season, it had to be a dry
season, immediately after the monsoons. In so far the question of a board
front vis-à-vis a narrow front had to be decided for an area of 1600
Kilometers frontage. Objectives which were separated had to be handled by
independent and strong forces. Alternatively, a concentration of force with
impressive superiority had to be arranged . Militarily, it was seen that while
the forme r would divide the Nepalese efforts, it would also result in lack of
superiority at critical points and critical times. The effect of operations on the
time schedule of the campaigning season also had to be considered.
Out of the deliberations, the British evolved the plan which we disus
subsequently. Psychological operations of winning over the people of the
occupied areas through various stratagems had to be dovetailed into the
plan.55 In effect it implied that:
 Whole of Kumaon and Garhwal, Basahar in Punjab hill states adjoining
Tibet to be captured.56
 Other areas to be freed of the Gorkha control.
 Military operations against Nepal to be progressed with a view to reach
as far as the Kathmandu Valley.
55
56
48
 Sikhs and Marathas were to be contained through alliance. The
Chinese were also to be assured that there was no permanent
territorial interest of the British in Nepal and the manoeuvre was
temporary.
Moira was fairly candid – and even boastful in his final report on stratagems
of subversions and political expediency. In his 2 August 1815 report he wrote:
" 114 with the operations of the troops it was my determination to combine a
system of political arrangement, calculated to promote and secure the objects
of the war. The basis of this system was to engage in our cause the expelled
Chiefs of the ancient hill principalities reduced by the Goorkas and thereby to
draw over to us their former subjects. The general tenor of my information
led me to belive that the detestation in which the Goorkas were held by the
inhabitants of the conquered territory, would induce them to avail themselves
of so favorable an opportunity as would be presented, through the invasion of
the Goorka dominions by a British army, to rise against their oppressors and
exert their utmost efforts for the subversion of their power. It was my intention
to employ the influence of their feelings in aid of our cause by engaging to
exclude forever the poor of the Goorkas and to re-establish the ancient line of
Princes under the guarantee of the British Government on no other
conditions than that the exertions of the people and their Chiefs should be
contributed in the way by which they could best promote the objects of the
war. Either from habitual dread of the Goorkas, or diffidence of our success,
occasioned by our failures in the early operations, this expectation was not
generally realized."
The Gorkhas
The Gorkhas evolved primarily a defensive overture. In the occupied areas
the troops were to fight through dissuasive operational art. At the home front,
the enemy was to be kept at bay; and not allowed to cross the border.
Adequate forces were to be concentrated at the expected points of
convergence of the enemy. The border of Nepal thus became a Laxman
49
Rekha or the limit of penetration for defense of Nepal, while
response was to be adopted in the occupied areas.
flexible
As commanders in situ were regarded the best judge of the terrain, the
positions they chose to defend and abandon was their prerogative. But the
overall strategies were worked out on two principles. Firstly, in occupied
areas, space was to be traded for time and a mobile defence with lines of
limit of resistance were to be selected. There was no control on battles from
Kathmandu, though reinforcements were planned. Secondly, the defence of
Nepal, was to be based on accepted border from where the enemy was to be
raided, attacked and finally destroyed. In both contingencies operational art
was to be based on fighting battles around the well defended forts.
Withdrawal from them to another set of defences was subject to the progress
of the battle.
Diplomacy was to be used for achieving a negotiated settlement of the entire
dispute with the British. The efforts at defusing tension and combat had to be
explored through all means. Search for allies on the concept of an 'Asian
Solidarity' had to be worked out constantly. Even the old enemies and
doubtful friends had to be won over. He pleaded to the Tibetans Marathas,
Rohillas, Sikhs, the Chinese for succour.57
It was a desperate effort in alliance, as except the Marathas, others were
strange bed fellows. Ranjit Singh as we saw had been tied on to the British
through the Treaty of Amritsar and he himself was watching the progess of
the battle. Until the end of the campaign he seems to have regarded the
Gorkhas as alien as the British, if not worse.
There are rare people who draw chestnuts out of fire for others. Ranjit Singh
and the others of the Indian states who still existed, were least venturing to
do that for Amar Singh in India. But even jumping the gun prematurely in this
57
50
matter of alliance, one cannot resist quoting Pemble's observation that "had
the Sikhs (of Ranjit Singh) and Marathas joined their strength to that of the
Gorkhas, it is hardly debatable that the British would have been expelled from
northern India".58 It would have definitely been for good. But the Indians
lacked strategic foresight and consequently were nibbled at, and finally
individually chewed-up. A golden opportunity was thus lost by India in
defeating an invasion and consolidating under one banner.
Back home, Bhim Sen Thapa tried to raise the morale of his people and told
them that the The British have taken Hindustan because no one had opposed
them. And their power and resources had geatly increased and they intended
to capture our territory. We shall have 22 lakhs people to expel them.59
The Gorkha Defensive Deployment
The Gorkhas streamlined their overall command in occupied territories.60
They occupied in varyig strengths the forts of Bhylee (Arki) subathu, Murni,
Jaithak, Jagatgarh, Kalunga, Virat, Rowain, Tasksal, Taragarh (Nalagarh),
Mustgarh, RAmgarh chain of forts, Rajgarh chain of forts including Malaun
and forts in Almora and Garhwal. The Gorkhas were thus compelled to
occupy larger number of forts and areas with lesser strength which seriously
threatened their defensive capability. They needed to follow a pragmatic
strategy of offering graduated and flexible response (stronger in the areas of
British advance and thinner in depth). But wrong assumptions perhaps led
them to following a uniform display of strength everywhere.
Preparation forward
58
59
60
51
Both sides began to work feverishly for the war from early 1814. The British,
in fact, began their intelligence collection from the time Moira landed as
Governor General and Commander-in-Chief. In that twin capacity he did not
have to refer his preparations for war to any one. Along with intelligence
began the psychological operations. The Gorkhas too were not inactive; they
collected their vital information through various means and sources.
However, they placed their reliance more on their 'valour' than the 'British
discretion'. The British employed with finnese, the Kautilyan stratagem of
Sam, Dam, Dand and Bhed.61
By 10 June 1814 instructions were issued to Rutherford to terminate all
diplomatic transitions with Nepal. So was the nominal trade. The war had
already begun on this date.62
The actual declaration of war against the Gorkhas is recorded as 1November
1814, though a decision had been taken eight months back and the war
began from mid-October. As part of the overall strategy, four divisions of the
Bengal Army were concentrated on four different axes stretched between
Danapur (Patna) in the east to Banaras to Bilaspur to Meerut, on the west.
ON both the flanks, two groups of Irregular forces operated in support of the
main operations. ON the east, leading form the Jalpaiguri-Siliguri corridor to
the fort of Nagri in Sikkim and on the west in Kumaon another group of
Irregular forces operated. These forces worked under Major Barre Latter of
the Rangpur Battalion with a force of 2400 men and Colonel Gardner (later
Colonel Nicolls), respectively. Latter had Irregulars from Bihar and Oudh
alongwith some local Gorkha settlers and a few Sikkimese. Under Gardner
there were some Regulars mixed with Irregulars. Hearsey's force, comprised
local Rohillas, Kumaonis, collected at Pilibhit for operations in the Kali
Kumaon.
Plan of Operations
61
62
52
The strategic objectives of Moira finally worked out as :
 1st Division (Div) under Major General Bannet Marley at Danapur, to
seize pass at Makwanpur, preliminary to advance to Kathamandu.
 2nd Div under Major General John Sulivan Wood having concentrated
a Benaras was to secure Butal, thence Palpa and advance to
Kathmandu where it was to link up with the 1st Div.
 3rd Div under Major General Rollo Gillespie was to advance to Dehra
Dun via Saharanpur and thence to Srinagar (Garhwal). He was to
operationally control Ochterlonyu as he advanced upto line NahanSubathu.
 4th Div under Colonel David Ochterlony to advance through Bilaspur to
Ramgarh, Arki/Malaun-Subathu- Jaithak and to link with Gillespie's
forces (where he would cease to be independent) for final march to
Srinagar.
Thus began, what Sir George Nugent one time C-in-C, described. "petty
warfare on the frontiers of the British territories which rarely lasted more than
one campaign and which always ended successfully". It was also epected
that Moira's foray into Kathmandu Valley would be over by the Christmas.
Both of them were in for shock.
A Simple Comparison of Forces
Before we proceed to analyse the operations as they developed, it is
necessary to compare the two forces as objectively as possible, in terms of
their strength, fire power, mobility, ability to reinforce, morale and fighting
techniques.
Based on the British intelligence and assessment (which were generally overestimated), the Gorkhas' strength was as given below:
(a)
Strength : 5,000-7000 in India.
10,000 in Nepal.
53
(b) 5,200 muskets (fusils) were reported to be distributed at Nahan (1,600)
Hindur (300) Basahar (500) Kumarsein (200) Subathu (500) Arki (2,000)
miscellaneous (100). It does not include weapons and strength at Sringar and
Kalunga. While the number of weapons did not exceed this figure, they were
distributed all over. One among those Gorkhas carried a fusil; the others
were armed with bow and arrows, Khukris, and swords, Weapons captured
during war were to be used to the best advantage.
(c)
Aritillery: 3 pounders-30-40 in India and Nepal.
4 pounders-Arki, Rajgarh and Jaithak.
1.5 pounders to 2 pounders-100 in India.
(d) The above strength of manpower, weapons and guns proved excessive
and inaccurate. The British estimates were based on hear say more than
correct assessments. However, these will still present a picture of the Gorkha
strength.
(e)
The strength given by Francis Hamilton in Nepal was also sketchy.
He listed strength as: Palpa 1,200; Chisapani 200; Bonat 1,200.
The initial British strength, on the other hand, is correctly tabulated as follows:
(a)
Cavalry-664.
(b)
Infantry- 4,061 (Europeans).
31,0008 (Natives).- final figure:52,180
17,111 (Irregulars).
(c)
Dromderry – 200.
Corps
(d)
Pioneers -843 .
(e)
Artillery – 3,628.
54
(f)
Private followers – 1,50,00 (Ochterlony's force had and logistic support.
42,134 followers alone.
(g)
Artillery Pieces – 106,
Field guns – 47, Howitzers – 20,
Siege guns – 14, Mortars – 23.
In comparison with Gorkhas, the British had an absolute superiority in
Cavalry, Pioneers and at least, the superiority of 10 times in Infantry and 100
times in Artillery. The Gorkhas, however, excelled in morale, fighting
technique, mobility, degree of tenacity, offensive spirit and above all, their
ability to sacrifice themselves for their cause.
55
Kalunga: The Battlefield of Bal Bhadra Singh and Robert Rollo Gillespie
Such is the fame and terror of our swords and Khukris that Bal Bhadra with a
nominal force of 600 destroyed an army of 3,000 to 4,000 English .. we are
here in Rajgarh eager to meet the enemy. In his famous letter of 2 March,
1815 Kazi Amar Singh Thapa.
Preamble
Kalinga or Kalunga have been associated with epoch making battles of India.
There are two such known names though not identical one in Orissa and
another in the Dehra Dun Valley. In the former, Ashoka, (or Asoka BC320230) is known to have defeated his adversary and caused such widespread
slaughter that he wept for months after the battle. It metamorphosized his life
and turned him into arighteous Buddhist King and his deeds justly added a
cognomen of 'Great' to his name. Kalunga of Dun, created the legend of the
Bravest of Braves for Bal Bhadra, a Gorkha defender of this non descript
fort.
In the case of Kalunga of the Dun Valley, it was a different kind of scenario,
yet strategically as important a landmark as the Ashokan Kalinga, It became
a battlefield between two foreign invaders of India the Gorkhas of Nepal who
had been in occupation of this area for the past decade and the Englishmen
of East India Company on a mission of expansion into the Himalayas. History
can never forgive Indians of That period who reduced themselves to that
state of impotence which allowed the foreigners such a free hand, while they
helplessly watched such developments. Some of them even joined one of
the belligerents in total disregard to thir feelings or dignity or nationalism.
There were two distinct effects of Kalunga: it set the British to rethink about
their own strength and tactics and led accordingly to defeat the Gorkhas
more by deceit than by raw bravery and they developed a grudging
admiration for the Gorkha johnies which eventually led to the Gorkhas joining
the Indian Army.
56
The Gorkhas in occupation of the Kumaon Hills since 1790 and Garhwal from
1804 and the Punjab Hill States thereafter, had entrenched themselves in
various area. In the Dun Valley it was in the areas of Kalunga and Mohand
Pass on the Sivalik That they took firm control. After a decade of the Gorkha
invasion, the descendants of late Raja Pradyuman Shah (Sudarshan Shah)
living in a state of poverty in Saharanpur and Faizabad invited the British to
dislodge them from the areas occupied. Similar request went from the
Chands now in asylum in Bareilly and the Oudh. Much effort had also been
made by Harsh Dev Joshi, that enigmatic character who historians see both
as a quisling and a replica of Duke of Warwickshire i.e., both a patriot and a
pretender. He must have released his march of folly when he initially invited
the Gorkhas to help him obtain the throne of Chands and he lost weatever he
could have received otherwise. Notwithstanding his fear of the British, he
thought them to be a better Devil than the Gorkhas. But there is no doubt that
he became responsible for causing an historical disaster in Uttarakhand
which spilled into Kohistan and brought about subjugation of the area.
Kalunga came to be seen by various writers and observers according to their
own perceptions. Edward Bishop called it a "rickety wood and stone
stockade".63 Walton Hamilton described it more aptly as he wrote: " A fortress
in Garhwal, 26miles north of Haridwar. Latitude 30 degrees 20 minutes north;
longitude 78 degrees 6 minutes east. A little to the north east of Kalunga are
manu caves inhabited by a race of people nearly in a state of nature. These
caves are low, narrow and are very dark having no aperture but entrance.
The food of these troglodytes is rice of large gain." His earlier description
was: "About 2.5 miles north east of Deyrha, 75 miles from Srinagar. Height
3,268 feet. A small miserable stone castle occupied by a Goorkha garrison.
Celebrity only due to two bloody repulses experienced by the British in
1814".64
63
Better to Die: The story of Gurkhas PP 17 and USI Vol XLII October 1913
64
Geographical Statistical and Historical Description. PP 641 and 71-72.
57
The history of HM's 53rd Regiment, however described Kalunga fort as of
"excellent stone masonry, more formidable than it had been represented to
be and not taken without a cannon". This Battalion had fought in the battle of
Kalunga and suffered frightfully. Its description, therefore, could not be too far
wrong. Colonel W Shakespear who visited the area in 1913 described it as
follows: "Having consisted of irregular pentagon in shape crowning the
highest point of the hill, a large stockade at the north end of the ride
overlooking the village of Lakhund, while another line of stockades covered
east side of the ground towards the village side of Kalunga (non existent).
This side being less steep and more easy to attack. On a small knoll the
Nepalse had a small stockade. The walls of the main fort were of no great
height and were at this time in an unfinished state. The entrance was through
a wicket gate on the north east side."65
The importance of occupying defences over this feature is highlighted again
by Colonel Shakespear: "The Nalapani fort of Kalunga guarded the chief
route at that time from Dehra Dun to Tehri. It stood on a low lying hill
overlooking Nalapani and the Song Valley, 3 miles east of Dehra". There
were, indeed, bridal tracks over today's Mussoorie Chamba feature and
another alternate route via Rishikesh-Chamba-Tehri. There now are only telltale marks. Even in 1913, Shakespear had found this site covered with thick
jungles and lines of defences difficult to make out.
Kalunga 180 Years After
The road to Kalunga on which the author traveled is aligned through the
Raipur Defence establishment to Tapowan, a small Arya Samaj temple
complex on the dry nala bed. It climbs up through the old Nalapani village
where the people draw water from an old cemented water reservoir. Some
attributed it to have been made about the time the Gorkhas ruled the roost.
Here I met a Gorkha Sadhu at Rudreswar Temple and NS Gureria who are
regarded as authority on the Kalunga Battle. The Sadhu, said that as late as
late as 1940 he had seen water there and the pipe lines to bungalow known
65
HM's 53rd's History PP 113; Shakespear's article in USI Journal Vol XLII October 1913.
58
as Zephyre Hall. The one time Superintendant of the Dun, F Shore and Lieut
Fredrick Young had made the bungalow jointly. Like Kalunga fort, it has only
the remnants left. According to Guleria, his grandfather was witness to the
Kalunga scene. For our ground reconnaissance his ex-soldier son and his
grandson joined me. Soon we were at the site of Kalunga.
Bal Bhadra Takes A Stand
The Gorkah is a natural meson and is even an architect. Here in Kalunga
they (the Gorkhas) had free labour available among the locals to dig, build
embankment around the perimeters, help create the lake and so on. The lake
which Gorkhas called Sagar Talao has distinct remains. As late as 1940s,
says Guleria, there was water in t he lake, which even served as an irrigation
channel to their dry fields in Nalapani. We trekked further up to the hill top
whose northern, north-western faces are fairly steep. On its west and further
north-east-east it tapers gradually. The northern face has sharp gradient,
knife edged spurs and steep escarpments.
For defence and protection, the Gorkhas built a 'Stone and wood fort' on the
highest point. Some reservoirs for water and magazines for weapons were
also built up. Out of one such earthwork, which is flushed to the ground, we
dug out stones and bricks cemented by quick lime. They are two centuries
old, yet strong. On and around Kalunga Captain Bal Bhadra, a young man of
35 built a mini-town with lob houses, the rest house for officers, billets for
men, leisure homes for local women, armoury, cook houses, cattle sheds,
training areas and even play fields. Storage for grains and provisions were
created. Most of his time was spent on improving a defensive wall that he
built on the lower rim of the hill or on collecting revenue, rations and
suppressing small resistance that the locals put up when they raised their
voices to the Gorkhas taking away their mulching cows or young girls.
59
On such a jungle there would inevitably have been problem of water. Bal
Bhadra found a water spring on the northern face of the feature. In October,
which is immediately after the rainy season, the area is green; its
undergrowth full and movement, difficult. The lake, however, must have been
full of water.
Despite a lake and a water spring on the eastern slope, water remained a
problem for the Gorkhas. It became their Achilles Heel everywhere from
Kalunga to Malaun. In their initial assaults which invariably failed everywhere,
the British succeeded only by staging a coup de grace for water points on
lower heights and then laying siege to the defences of the Gorkhas.
Kalunga is a helmet shaped feature with North-south wooded spread. In
selecting Kalunga as a defensive position Bal Bhadra had shown not only a
fine understanding of the gorund bout also of the likely threat that hel had to
contend with form Tehri and from the south. Its north-western face have
sharp gradients, virtually unassailable. To attack it, one had to reach the
plateau either from the north or the south. The jungle clad Kalunga feature
provided natural cover, all round view and domination of the area both by fire
and observation. The wood provided the fuel and construction material.
Captain Bal Bhadra Kanwar deployed about 1,000 Gorkhas and Garhwalis in
the Dun-Kyadrah Valleys that extened from Dun to Kalsi (Below Chakrata).
His defences guarded the British ingress from the axes of Mohund pass,
Timli Pass and Haridwar. His troops included lightly equipped troops at
Mohund, Timli, the forts of Virat and the main strength being concentrated on
Kalunga. His defences had to be co-ordinated with his movements to
Srinagar and Sirmur. The strength which he had on Kalunga proper was
about 600 and included 200 Gorkhas, the same number of Garhwalis and
balance being women and children. At Virat there were 150 and the
remainder were scattered in penny-packets for collection duties, manning the
stockades on the two passes and for controlling the local villages.
60
In early 1814 Bal Bhadra had been visited by Amar Singh who had advised
him to concentrate his force at Kalunga and carry out extensive improvement
to the fort, ensuring that the water reservoir was protected. In his
assessment, Amar Singh had asked Bal Bhadra to stock rations and
provisions for a least 5 months when he thought situation should improve.
A man of ingenuity and of cool courage, Bal Bhadra set about improving the
fort with his full might. And by Semptember, he had, constructed the fort
though not totally made shell proof; built a perimeter of walls and created
sufficient confidence among his force through training and indoctrination. The
latter was done by him through religious service and drumming into his
people that no one could defeat the Gorkhas. If the British were trying to
wean away the locals, so eree the Gorkhas, specially in the valley where
most of the Zamindars of Garhwal and Mahant decided to help him. He built
up his intelligaence by employing the Sadhus and locals as much as
possible. His concern in intelligence were largely the European Infantry,
Cavalry and the large caliber guns which the British would employ against
him. He also learnt the British technique of assault by personally visiting
Bharatpur and understanding their technique of breaching the fort and
Charging through the beach. Funneling through a breach was critical for an
attacker, as it was for the defenders. He realized that he would have to plug it
to prevent the attackers from 'flooding' the fort.
Secretly, he began to build a moat inside the fort, to surprise the British.
Along with it also came the idea of Panjis and Wicket Gates over which he
could mount the guns in more destructive and lethal manner. All along he
placed the musketeers who could fire their muskets upto 150 yards, then
archers could shoot their arrows at the enemy between 35 and 75 yards. And
if the enemy draw closer, there were small hard pieces of rocks to be hurled
at them, with wooden catapults and by hands. For those who still got closer,
the ultimate Gorkha weapon, the helavy weighted Khukris, the personal
weapon of each Gorkha- man, woman and child- was there to finally contest
the enemy at the close quarters.
61
The women joined the men in defence as actively as combatants. The
western modern army who employed female folks as stretcher bearers or
musicians, must have viewed these brave women with awe.
The small caliber artillery he had, were to be located on the ramparts where
their solid and grape shots could engage at ranges upto 500 yards. He tried
to move he larger caliber guns form Sringar but he had to contend with 2, 3
pounders and 6 smaller guns. He anticipated the local might desert and those
who did not, might serve as a boon but they had to be watched and then only
employed in sensitive points. He expected uprising in the Valley and his
supplies being disrupted. But to Amar Singh he as sured that he will fight till
his end or when orderd otherwise. Armar Singh promised him that
reinforcements, to the extent possible, will be sent to him.
Rollo Gillespie Rolls into Dun
Situation had crystallized by May 1814. The war clouds had become darker
and the possibility of it precipitating became imminent as the British provoked
Gorkha retaliation on a police post soudth of Palpa in mid-May. The final mail
was driven into the coffin of the Anglo-Gorkha peace immediately after this
incident, when Lord Moira recorded his views: "The British Government has
long borne the conduct of the Nepalese with unexampled patience.. But
forbearance and moderation must have their limits .. the British Government
having been compelled to take up arms in defence of its rights, its interests
and honour ….. "To this Bhim Sen Thapa countered by having said in April
1814 –" How will English be able to penetrate into our hills … our hills and
fastness are formed by the hands of God and are impregnable." "His Father
at Palpa also told everyone that the battalions he had raised were better than
the Europeans'. A verbal propaganda and counter propaganda was at its
pitch.66
Sunder Lal at PP 61 remarked that most of the locals of Garhwal were fighting for the Gorkhas. While
some Khasi Zamindars like Jeevan Singh Helped the British, other were with the Gorkhas, most prominent
of these being half the strength at Kalunga consisted to them. Even for battle at Kangra a large number of
Kumaonis and Garhwalis were enrolled. Edund Candler, a contemporary historian mentions the particularly
incredible spirit of the Garhwalis in employment of the Gorkhas at Kalunga. He wrote "without their help me
66
62
We concentrate on Rollo Gillespie's 3rd Division (Div), leaving others on their
march elsewhere, But first Gillespie himself. Gillespie had joined the King's
Army and served in East India Company in Java and India. He had turned
every expedition including the Caribbean venture as interesting examples
both for notoriety and military virtue of those times. He fought with every man
whose face he hated and he sepnt more than he earned living off the loans
from the regimental contractors or even through false claims and other
means which appeared fair only to him. But it must be said in praise of his
military balour that he was brave like a tiger. In the Caribbean, as in Java and
later in he Vellore Mutiny (1806), the British successes were mostly due to
his bold leadership and resoluteness. He turned every situation to the
advantage of the British.
He was rebellious, a small despot in so far military discipline was concerned
and he could steal the affection of any brother officer's wife with almost
impunity. Whenever in difficulty with the establishment, he saved himself by
opting out of the present appointment for more adventurous assignments. But
the British needed young officers like him on the model of Robert Clive or
else what they achieved, would have taken them an other century or perhaps
never.67
Promotions came in his way and by the time the drum beating of the AngloGorkha war was on, he had two crossed swords and a Subalten's pips on his
shoulders making him a Major General. As a King's Officer though younger
he superseded the Company's officers, David Ochterlony included. David
was still a Colonel with almost double the Gillespie's service.
Gorkhas could not have so obdurately stuck to their position against an enemy of superior strength and fire
power." Similar tribute has been given in the history of Second Gorkha Regiment. It says: "It will be seen
that a small force had actually been collected during November 1814 while Kalunga Fort was still defying and
these were largely Garhwalis from Srinagar."
67
Campbell Sketch reproduced by Hasrat PP 184 and PRNW 144.
63
So here was Gillespie, General Officers Commanding 3 Div assigned to
capture the Gorkha defences in the Dun. But as soon as this assignment was
given to him he grew serious in tone as stories of Gorkha bravery and
determination of their commander, traveled to him at Meerut and Saharanpur.
He know it would be a grim battle. As he began traveling up, he wrote to a
friend: "The summits are narrow .. Valleys extremely confined .. not a spot to
be seen to afford room for one thousand men in the tents … neither yielding
shelter to birds or air … not the bwast of the fields".
The Dun Valley was approachable via Timli, Mohand and Rishikesh/
Haridwar. In Gillespie's appreciation, he saw "The country… every yard a
post and Gorkhalis are very warlike active people". He deduced he will have
to move in several columns and he also had a premonition of a bad
beginning and feared disaster. But like a good commander he kept on
visualizing the battle for himself. His letter to a friend which he wrote, gives
out his feelings besides the plan as it would take shape: "My force is rapidly
collecting at Saharanpur. I expect to make them on Dun by about 23rd/24th
October or 1st November in order to support Ochterlony's attempt against
Nalagarh and his eventual proceeding against Amar Singh. Lord Hastings
(Moira) has in a great measure left movements
of the Div to Myself. I am inclined to think he will find permanent undertaking
more arduous and difficult than he imagines …."68
Gillespie's force was really strong. It had a British Infantry and Cavalry
regiment each with a squadron of native cavalry, 16 pieces of artillery (later
increased to 20) two Pioneer companies and 10 Native Infantry regiments (20
Battalions). The actual orbat ran :
8th Royal Irish Dragoons (Gillespie's won regiment).
7th Native Cavalry; Skinners Horse (One squadron).
HM's 53rd, Foot (Lieutenant Colonel Setbright Mawbey).
68
For details see Chapter on Leadership (Reflections).
64
1st , 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 16th, 17th 26th 27th Native Infantry.
Artillery. Two troops of Horsed Artillery (1st and 3rd) were allotted from Meerut
to join the Div.
Pioneers. 5 and 6 companies with officers from Engineers.
In addition there were 6,668 Irregulars, whose strength continued to increase
as the operations advanced.69
In terms of relative strength, mobility, fire power and logistic capability, the
ratio of force levels of the British when compared with Bal Bhadra's reckons
at least 30 times. A true case of a Goliath versus David.
The Div having assembled at Saharanpur by 18 October 1814. Gillespie's
plan for forward concentration and operation took shape.
Based on intelligence, he sent elements to carry out reconnaissance's in
force to Timli Pass, Kasumri (Kheri) and Mohand Pass as they looked into
Kydra Dun and Dun Valleys. On capture of these passes, the force was to
advance and capture crossing places, ferries and fords on the Jamuna and
the Ganges at Rampur Mandi and Rishikesh. Along with a troop of the
Dragoons three companies of light Infantry were to move to Badshahibagh
(Towards Paonta Sahib) to maintain surveillance over the crossing on the
Jamuna and also act as a firm base for further movement of troops.
The rest of the Div divided itself into two large columns i.e., an advance
group under Colones Mawbey and another under Colonel Carpenter,
Mawbey's column consisted of 1,300 Infantry, 300 Cavalry and 5 guns which
traveled over the path form Saharanpur to Kaumri over to Kheri Pass on the
69
Memoirs of Sir Gillespie for TE Egerton (1816).
65
Shivalik and then descend into the Dun Valley and headed for
Kalunga/Rishikesh. HM's 53rd with the exception of three companies formed
part of column. The second column under Carpenter comprising 17NI,
Horsed Artillery moved aong the Mohund to the areas of modern Clement
Town and thence to Nalapani.
Gillespie followed the column to Timli and was in Badshaibagh to carry out
his operational reconnaissance for the axis of Virat.
While the main force moved to the Valley a mixed force of Cavalry and
Horsed Artillery was sent to Pinjore, the stronghold of the Gorkhas there
being Mustgarh. This was to act as deception for both Gillespie and
Ochterlony. See sketch giving out developments schematically.
Considering the overall merit of the plan, it looked a brilliantly conceived
military plan which could offer several courses of action to beat the enemy
decisively.
Mawbey was in Dun by October 22 and he set himself on carrying out
reconnaissance. It soon ran into Bal Bhadra's early warning detachments
near Nalapani, enroute Rishikesh and was driven back. Having achieved
that, Bal Bhadra's men withdrew to the fort of Kalunga. Mawbey's reaction to
the interruption of his early warning detachment assigned to move to
Rishikesh near Nalapani by Bal Bhadra's marauding Gorkhas, was
spontaneous and bold. The following morning leaving a rear party in the main
camp which he established on the sahasradhara Road, he took a large force
to the Table Top to intimidate Bal Bhadra.He deployed his five guns within
1,000 yards of the post and began to engage it without any effect. when a
continuous gun firing produced no effect on the fort, he, according to the
Dragoon's History " Summoned the Gorkhas to surrender". The message
delivered at mid-night, received a courteous but firm reply from Bal Bhadra
66
that it was not in his habit to carry on carry on correspondence at such an
"unreasonable hour".70
The Dragoons who later suffered at hands of Gorkhas, had put it mildly. In
fact, Bal Bhadra was angry at this misdemeanour and he conveyed so. A
Gorkha when furious, behaves like Hindu God Lord Shiv, at his death dance.
"That night", wrothe Francis Tuker, "a message offering terms came from
British Command. Bal Bhadra remarking that he did not accept letter at that
hour, tore it up." 71 The letter Tanta mounted to "summon to surrender", as
Colonel Shakespeare calls it. When Bal Bhadra did not follow it with any
other response, Mawbey sent a courier to Gillespie at Badshahibagh, for
futher directions.
Gillespie had by then marched through the Timli Pass, got closer to Kalsi and
Virat and on receiving the courier form Mawbey headed Kalsi and Virat and
on receiving the courier from Mawbey headed straight to the main force. His
plan earlier was to reconnoiter the axis Kalsi, Rumtum and Virat. But
Mawbey's message changed the complex of the battle. In total fury, he
moved along with detachments, to the area of Kalunga, putting Captain
Campbell on his earlier task. He was good at writing. He wrote from the camp
(Where now stands his memorial) to a friend, his last letter: "Me Voici-in the
far farmed Dhoon- the Temple of Asia and the most beautiful valley it is; the
climate exceeding everything, I have hitherto experienced in India. I received
report that Mawbey failed …. You may imagine this check completely
changed my plans and here I am with as stiff and strong opposition as ever I
saw, garrisoned by men who are fighting pro arise et focis in my front and
who have decidedly formed the resolution to dispute the fort as long as a
main alive".
70
The Official Strength of Gillespie's Div was 17,000.
History of the Royal Irish Hussars (1693-1927) PP 370 and Tuker's Gorkha: A history of the Gorkhas;
Shakespear PP 372. Of interest, the queen's Royal Irish Hussars, the descendent of the Royal Irish Hussars
had Lieut Winston Churchill before the Boer war. He was to be come the world famous War time leader of
Great Britain.
71
67
Gillespie, the hero of Vellore and Java was for the first time, seeing an enemy
who would give not a quarter without taking adequate blood for it. So he
wrote in the same letter to his friend: "The fort stands on the summit of an
almost impossible mountain and covered with impenetrable jungle; the only
approaches commanded and stiffly stockaded. It will be a tough job to take it
but by first proximo I think I shall have it, Sub Auspice Deo." It was like Insha
Allah of Mohammed at Battle of Badr !
By 24 October, Mawbey's guns began to fire on the Kalunga fort. Shells fell
short or went overhead; a few landed on the 'Sagar Talao' and caused
breaches. The lake began to drain out. The Englishman did not know of the
damage then. Water began to dry but the spring at the north east had still
good water supply to feed the garrison. Then there was no worthwhile
artillery with the defenders to reply and neutralize the British guns.
In the meanwhile, Gillespie evolved his operational plan for a multidirectional
attack on Kalunga on 30/31 October 1814. The columns were assigned task
and organized:72
 Column 1. under Colonel Carpenter. His force comprised four
companies each of HM's 53rd and 15th NI and Light Companies 6th NI,
whole of 7th NI under Major Wilson. Detachment of Pioneers were to
Carry ladders. Golandaz and Laskars were grouped to provide gun
support. Its objective was to attack frontally from the Table Land. It was
to depart at 3.30 pm on 30 October.
 Column 2. Under Captain John Fast. His force had three companies of
17th NI, one Light Company, whole of 27th NI, 16th Pioneers and
Golandazs. It was to attack Kalunga from north after concentrating at
Karsiali (Kursiali). Time to depart at 2 a.m. on 31 October.
 Column 3. With a strength of 529 under Major Kelly that had
components from 7th NI, Light Companies of 1st NI and 5th NI and 20th
Pioneers. It moved at 2 a.m. on 31 October. It was to develop its axis of
attack from Lakhund.
See PP 38-39 History of Bengal Artillery, giving out Excerpts fro the Orders of Gillespie given at the end of
notes.
72
68
 Column 4. Under Captain John Campbell. With tow Granaders
companies of 6th NI, one light company and 16th NI. Its task involved
an assault from the Asthal axis. Like other outflanking columns it also
moved at 2 a.m. on 31 October.
 Reserves under Major Ludlow with four companies of 8th NI,
detachments of 9th NI, balance of 6th NI with two Light Companies, and
all the Cavalry.
The interesting aspects of the plan were the coordination of the assault and
certain orders which Gillespie emphasized to his assaulting commanders
(see foot notes). He wanted strict fire control, use of bayonet rather than fire,
observance of strict silence on halting to fire or releasing when the assault
began and all attacks to be simultaneous. Purely from tactical aspects the
plan he evolved is easily a modern tactical concept of multi directional attack,
attempting to crack a nut with a hammer. Good terrain intelligence and
guidance by locals enabled Gillespie to plan it.
Nonetheless, the plan had discrepancies and it warranted a minute to minute
coordination in the context of the battle as the final and most vital aspects of
the plan were governed by one clause: As part of the plan five guns were to
fire at 9 am 31 October and the attack by the three columns was to proceed
after 120 minutes i.e. at 11 am. This timings had to be sacrosanct for both the
commander controlling the whole operations that is Gillespie – and the
outflanking columns of adhere to the plan of movement. It became vitally
important as the columns moved out and thereafter there could be no control
on their operations. The other flaw which he failed to take into account was
the imponderables of war such as the weather, the terrain demanding more
time for movement, the human factor of fatigue, the echoing effect on the
acoustics of the gun due to the hilly terrain, besides the unpredictable
reactions of the Gorkhas.
The Attack Gears Up
The artillery pieces were brought up on elephants and deployed during the
night of 30/31 October under Major Pennington, assisted by Lieut Blair, the
69
Engineer and Captain Byers, Gillespie's Aide-De-Camp. Gillespie by nature,
a restless man, moved not only the guns but whole force of Ludlow and Kelly
amounting to nearly 3,000. By the fall of the night he began to toy with the
idea of surprising the Gorkhas from the Table Land and by the morning he
had decided to advance the timings of firing of his guns by 60 minutes.
Accordingly, they began their signal firing at 8 am , 31 October. The
outflanking columns either ignored the firing or did not hear it. Bal Bhadra
was prepared to stake any sacrifice to neutralize these 'wretched' guns. And
he ordered his detachment deployed on the knoll close by to assault them.
Some 50 men crawled around and charged at the firing guns. However, it
caused several casualties to the Gorkhas and the survivors managed to
retreat to the Fort. Lieut PC Kennedy whose guns were attacked by the
Gorkhas, thought that the retreat of the Gorkhas further encouraged Gillespie
to progress the attack.
70
The First Assault
At 10 am Major John Ludlow was ordered to assault. Ludlow had under him
dismounted Irish Dragoons that provided the advance guard of Carpenter
and Ludlow's force. The two companies of HM's 53rd and whole of
Carpenter's force, joined up the Ludlow force and organized the attack. The
Dragoons73 led the attack followed by the HM's and Carpenter's force. In their
élan the Dragoons pressed the attack and reached the out skirts of the fort
where the Gorkhas were 'swarming' at the base of the walls. They engaged
the on-coming Dragoons with their Khukris and within minutes, 88 Dragoons
lay wounded with 4 dead. In his letter of 1 December 1814, Bal Bahadra
wrote: "In this attack Ripu Darman was badly wounded but he still made to
Srinager. Jamadar Mangal Rana killed three Gora (British) with his Khukri
outside the fort. Acts of bravery of Subedar Vanu Basnait, Jang Singh Thapa,
Jamadar Vijai Vir Gharti, Chandra Mani Rana saved the day. They also
planned the evacuation of the fort." It is obvious that the Gorkhas would have
vacated the fort even during October.74
As the assault went in, Gillespie accompanied by Lieut Colonel Westnra,
Commanding Officer Dragoons, Major Stevenson, the Commisary General,
William Fraser, the political agent and PC Kennedy, the gunner officer moved
up to a vantage point from where they could observe the battle. The
massacre of the Dragoons shook Gillespie and he tried to move the slowly
crawling HM's 53rd and the Sepoys, forward. However, there was little
enthusiasm from these ftoops as the walking wounded of the Dragoons
returned bleeding the cursing.
8th Light Dragoon was formed in 1693 as Irish Protestants. Changed to Light Dragoons in 1775. In Indai
saw service at Agra. Laswari, Deeg. It also fought War in Afghanistan, Crim. See British Army Regimental
Records, Badges, Devices etc. by Major JH Lawerence Archer.
73
74
From Original Letters.
71
Not disappointed at the dithering by Ludlow's column in the first attempt,
Gillespie called the balance of HM's 53rd, from the camp and pushed them on
the plateau. A mixed column of about 900 men consisting of HM's 53rd
(including those who had reached the camp and they were moved up post
haste) formed the second wave of the Ludlow and Carpenter force. Off they
were pushed by Gillespie to teach a lesson to "recalcitrant Gorkhas." The
HM's troops moved up- some running, some walking through the blackened
rocks. Following them moved the Sepoys. UP the slope, as they Straightened
themselves into assault formantion in the area of the plainer portion whrer
stood the huts of the Gorkha village, they were confronted by some 150
Gorkhas. Their Khukris glistening against the rays of the October morning
sun, they engaged the British troops in their ceremonials, knapsacks and
long bayoneted riffles.
Before these troops could shake themselves up into an assault formation and
the guns from rear could fire, the Gorkhas ran forward cruing their battle cry
Ayo Gorkhali Ayo Gorkhali.. Behand them followed Bal Bhadra with his long
sword and a flag stuck on a pole, bearing a massive Hanuman on a yellow
cloth. Near him stood the band playing the tune of O Nepali Sar Uchali ( Ye
Gorkhas keep heads high). The attacking Gorkhas swung their Khukris in
high and low angles chopping heads and wounding more. Leaving the dead
behind, the remaining attackers ran back.
This second attack also proved disastrous and left Gillespie fuming in anger,
and inwardly quailing at the loss of the good name of the Europeans, who
sometime back, he had boasted to be superior to the Orientals. It was now,
he felt, the Europeans were at disrepute. He told those around him that HM's
53rd had let him down. He stopped the retreating rabbles and asked Ludlow
and Carpenter to reform and get a hold on the troops. They were to be
pushed forward and told to try the left side of the fort where the slope was
gentle. They moved up but soon ran into the perimeter walls of the so called
Gorkha village. Ladders were laid and men exhorted to climb up. When
hesitation appeared on the men's faces Lieut Ellis climbed on one of the
ladders.75 That got him a sniper's shot. He fell down and lay dying. Some
75
Nepal ko Sainik Itihas PP 392.
72
men attempted to climb the two other ladders and having reached the wall,
they saw Panjis and inner moat. They retracted, retreated with all others as
the Gorkhas appeared from their right and left. They ran and did not stop until
the water reservoir. "They are damned barbarians … bloody Goorkaas", said
they, amidst the shouts of cursing and grumbling Most had thrown their
muskets away.
Gillespie bit his lips and ground his teeth. By now Mawbey had joined him.
Lieut Kennedy who was nearby with his horsed guns was told to take a dash
forward, as far as possible, closer to the fort and take a direct shoot at the
gate . The breach it would cause would enable the assaulting echelons to
funnel into the Fort. He was also told to take on a Gorkha gun that was
coughing sharpnels into the attackers.
Kennedy, in a fine dash, moved the horses forward to about 100 yards of the
outwork protecting the gateway and to enfilade the wall upon that side. It
was now 11.15 am and the marching columns had not yet got close by and
were not visible. Getting mad about failure, as 21 had ben killed and 190
wounded, and nothing had been achieved, Gillespie decided to set in an
unprecedented example of leadership by personally leading the assault
wave.
While we pause for breath, as Gillespie did, we look for the first hand account
of the final stage of the battle, most of its being taken from Kennedy's
statement in the enquiry that met in Meerut, later:76
"An enfilade gun placed at an open wicket of the fort swept down many.
Ensign was killed, Lieut Elliot was badly wounded, the troops then retreated.
Ladders which were left among the huts which were the fire about this time.
History of Bengal Artillery PP 5; and reproduced in Nepal and East India Company, by BD Sanwal, PP 158159.
76
73
Nothing was heard of the other columns. Gillespie, on receiving the report of
the failure ordered forward three companies of the 53rd, which had just
arrived and a battery under Captain Coultman with tow horse artillery guns
under kennedy to blow open the gate … (it) reached within sixty or eighty
yards of the bastion and a sharp musketry fire was opened on them. The
Teneral accompanied by Colonel of Dragoons and his staff came up here
and they went forward leaving Lieut Campbell to cover their advance.
Passing through the village, the huts still burning and much impeded by the
dead and wounded of the preceding columns, they came to a turn in the road
in the full sight of the gate of the Fort, some fifty or sixty yards off.
Lieuts Kennedy and Blane ran forward to select the position brought77 to 30
to 40 feet. But those who should have gone forward, wavered and the fire of
the matchlocks and arrows told with effect upon the leading sub-divisions. In
vain did the General respect his orders for the men to charge. The wooden
bar across the entrance were broken by the fire of the gun and a party of
stout Gorkhas rushed out. General Gillespie was frantic. Major Luidlow
appeared at this juncture with several officers and Sepoys and was desired to
attack to the right, where there was supposed to be an entrance; the horse
artillery men were ordered to arm themselves with muskets to the dead. The
supply was not a scanty one. And when this was done, the General with his
sword in hand and a double-barrelled pistol in the other turned to Lieut
Kennedy and the rest, exclaiming; Come on my lads, and now Charles
(Kennedy), for the honour of the county Down.78
Only a pace or two forward he fell with a bullet though heart. So here was the
eye-witness account of the charge of Gillespie, the brave, against a more
A near similar situation came in the Anglo-Sikh War 1845-46. Henry Smith's Brigade was surrounded by
Sikhs near Mudki but failed to exploit advantage due to Lal Singh's "cowardice and incapacity". See history
of Sikhs by JD Cunningham (1919) and Short History of Sikhs by Ch Pyne (1915); Dictionary of English
History PP 979. Brig Sir Henry Smith had exhorted the Indian and British troops to unkeep the honour or
the British arms. He had said. A British Army mustnot be foiled and failed this Army shall not be. It was
'victorious or die' for General Sir Hughes too. Sheer determination won the day. But not at Kalung.
77
At the First Field Marsha Cariappa lecture at the Vigyan Bhavan on 26 October 1995, Sam had referred to
the Gorkhas as being the most brave people.
78
74
braver people who in the words of Field Marshal SHFJ Menekswaw are the
only "unafraid (fearless) brave people."79
With Gillespie also went Byre and Ludlow's Adjutant, O' Hara, who was
wounded. Lieut Young and Kennedy rushed forward to retrieve Gillespie.
Young's biography narrates that Gillespie died in his arms. The Dragoons'
History records that the attack was abandoned and the remanents of the
force retreated under Capt Campbell, who had arrived from his out flanking
move by now.
The history of 53rd HM's describes the battle in their own way: "The two
companies lost several men and Lieuts Young and Anstic severely wounded;
three of the columns had not advanced and the messengers never reached
their destinations … The ladders had been burnt alongwith the Gorkha huts
and the storming party lost 15 killed and 75 wounded". There is a foot note to
the narrative which suggests the state of morale of 53rd. "Gillespie had
harangued the 53rd for turning up late and the tradition of the men were
discontented and while holding the ground, would not advance … also these
failures were because of feeling between the officers of two battalions that
led to duels." 80 It vindicates the state of relationship that existed between
the King's troops and the Company's troops. Not that it was a lcal problem
but endemic. Sir George Nugent had warned the Government that " a
secious deterioration in discipline and morale of the Army was being caused
by severe over-taxation of its patience and resources". 81 The memory of
White Mutiny, lingered on even in battle fields.
What the readers need to also appreciate is the excellent fire control
Gorkhas had and their marksmanship and their cool courage. And yet after
See History of King's Shropshire Light Infantry Regiment by Cannon Richard and Colonel W Rogerson.
The 53rd now known as 53rd and 85th Foot. It also served in St Helena, while Napoleon Bonaparte was in exile
there.
79
See Imperial Gazetteer Vol IV and Cambridge History Vol VI. White Mutiny was caused in 1809, due to
discontentment among the European officers and troops. Detailed notes elsewhere.
80
81
PRNW PP 465, and Ibid PP 467.
75
the battle got over, the survivors laughed, had their taut of drink and were
back to their defences. Some even followed the retreating Mawbey's force
and gave big smiles as if they had won a game from the British. They were
such happy breed of men.
Gillespie's death was 'regretted' by Moira and the failure of Kalunga was
regarded to deeply augment the loss which the Service and the Country had
sustained by the "distinguished gallant officer who personally conducted It
and whose conspicuous military talent must place him in the ranks of those
officers whose exploits have done (pride) to the British name in India".
Mawbey called Gillespie's death as "melancholy".82
It is here the British also got to know the Gorkha as an admirable
soldier, individual and human being. Bal bhadra allowed them to collect their
deads and wounded without mutilating them. It generated good feelings and
gave a vent to chivalry, besides the gallantry.
Bal Bhadra was, indeed, generous to his enemy but he was not naïve
to return their weapons. As the British retreated carrying away the body of
Gillespie Campbell managed to retrive Kennedy's guns. But the dead and the
seriously wounded lay in the battlefield. Bal Bhadra collected every bit of their
arms, ammunition and even flages, The Gorkhas had been reequipped with
better rifles along with the 150 reinforcement that trickled in, and were
determined to fight with better resolve with the British muskets-against the
British.
The Second Assault
Colonel Mawbey, according to Colonol Sandes, "sat down to bombard
the Frot while Engineers and Pioneers cut the water channel which supplied
82
Sandes P 235.
76
water to the Gorkha camp. He demanded reinforcement of additional troops
and battering guns before an attack could go in"83 He, however laid a cordon
around the Gorkha defence, His 20 pieces of artillery continued to bombard
the Gorkha positions. The constant harassing fire caused casualties nd
fatigue. The re-inforcements of some 200-300 men which sat on the
Saknyana Hill, tired to move in and about half the number infiltrated into the
Frot.
Mawbey had fired 1,200 rounds of guns and mortars by 26
November.84 As to the actual attack on the Gorkhas, Mawbey dithered,
despite more than 4000 combatants. In support of his non-activity he had
been referring to Adjuant General's letter of 1 October which advised caution
in the event of lack of wherewithal. Gillespie's death had shaken him, as all
the others.
By 20 November 1/3 NI located at Moradabad was moved to Nalapani
and so were the battering guns consisting of 4, 18 pounders under Captain
William Battine and Captain Car Michael, the Engineer officer. By 24 th
Mawbey's plan of attack of the second time began to take shape. On the
same day, Bal Bhadra counter attacked the battery, which was beaten back .
Mawbey's plan was a simple one which is excerpted from Field Orders
of 27 November (PRNW pp 466) reads: "Storming party consisting of
Grenadiers companies, one company 53rd, new Light Company, under Major
Ingleby, The force to move with firelocks unloaded and carry the breach with
the bayonet."
The British view of the battle is recorded better though 'peppered', in
the history of 1/13 NI by Lieut General William Richards:
83
History of Bengal Artillery PP 30.
Based on the USI Journal of 1872-73. The actual casualties were one officer killed and 36 all ranks
wounded. But their morale being very poor, most did not attempt an actual assault.
84
77
Bal Bhadra had made a counter-attack on the morning of 24 Movember. The
advance of the force including 1/13 NI began until the gate of the breach
where a deep trench with bamboo Panjis and offers of reconciliation stopped
the battalion. The Gorkhas hurled every thing at the attacking column. Like
trapped injured lion, they would not let any one come close by. 1/13 th was
routed after two hours of contest. The attacking force was reduced to 70 from
its attacking strength of 600. Moira was furious at the failure as it tarnished
the image of the great fighters. Repeatedly reduced from aweful fire of
artillery, greatly reduced in number for want of water and food, Bal Bhadra
abandoned the fort and joined the reinforcement awaiting on Saknyana.
Amplifying on the battle principally, the history of 1/13 NI called the "Beach
practicable, in fact, as a chronicled failure", For, only Lieut Harrington of 53rd
ascended the breach and was killed. It grounded the operations. More guns
were then brought up. Lieut Edward hall built up a 12 pounder and Lieut John
Luxford a 5.5 inch howitzer, which he tried to drag to the breach and was
mortally wounded.
The Gorkhas also lost heavily but gave no sign of their weakening defences.
Of their determination, Colonel Shakespear wrote: "This was our first stiff
fight with the Nepalse, who here showed their grit and not only the men but
their women too. For there was a number of the latter in the fort, and these
true to the best traditions of their sex, helped man nobly, for they were seen
at the asssults on the walls throwing heavy stones on our men".85 They were
heard saying "Timiharu Sita Yudh Garne, Aru Ke Ho (Will fight you… and
what else)". A similar story is given by William Fraser, where he says: "The
defence was so desperate that I saw women actually throwing stones from
85
Colonel Shakespear's Article at PP374 of the USI Journal.
78
the walls. I was hit in five place with stones besides the arrow wound across
the throat."
The second major failure at Kaunga led Mawbey back to his camp but he
continued to fire his guns unabated. The casualties continued to increase.
Earlier, Bal Bhadra had been planning to finally vacate the Fort but delayed it
to the second assault by 27 November when the British had 755 casualties
including 75 killed, 680 wounded. The Gorkhas had been reduced form their
original strength of 600 to a mere 90 that he planned an abandonment
which, we will discuss subsequently. But they had carried on the struggle as
spiritedly as ever. Preferring death to surrender as observed by sundar Lal he
decided to fight his way out through the besieging force.86
On 30th November, the gun fire and the flight of arrows from the fort ceased
and when the British began to wonder about its cause and most cautiously
walked into the fort. They found it abandoned except bodies of 180 killed,
those dying and a few toddlers. Major Kelley, the officer incharge found the
whole area of fort a slaughter house strewn with the bodies of dead and
wounded and served limbs of those who had been torn into pieces by the
bursting of shells. Those who yet lived piteously, called out for water. The
stench of the place was dreadful and many of the bodies of those who had
been killed, had been insufficiently interred. Penderal Moon saw "those two
fruitless attacks costing casualties exceeding the total number of defenders a
stigma to the British bravery."87 Even Lord Moira recognized the Gorkhas
both as brave soldiers and humane enemy, who were entitled to being
treated well. As to his consolation he thought, it will be some trifling
consolation of the families and friends of brave heroes who have fallen before
Kalunga that no man ever fought so bravely or fell more regrettedly than the
whole lot of them did.88
86
Sunder Lal PP63.
87
Penderal Moon PP 378.
Mawbey's Report to Lord Moira after the battle of Kalunga in which the British casualties for second
attack were killed 4 officers, 27 Other Ranks and wounded 16 officers and 213 Other Ranks. So infuriated
was Moira that he ordered the Kalunga Fort to be razed to he ground. The Fort was destroyed on 2 December
1814; also Mawbey's report to Lord Moira through Lieut Colonel Fegan dated 01 December.
88
79
A Panoramic View of Battle of Kalunga
"The bravery with which the Gorkhas fought here and routed the English is
worth writing with a pen of gold. Gorkhas are unrivalled fighters. Had they
been wise rulers, it would have been excellence in something already
creditable", so wrote BD Pande.89
In 1994, I had spent almost a month in researching in Nepal, where most of
the part was spent in dusting off the old documents in the Royal Nepalese
Archive and in persuading the Royal Nepalese Army Headquarters (Singh
Durbar) to let me peruse their documents on this war. It was to see the other
side of the hill and as Machiavelli felt, to, "encompass the vantage points of
the Generals on both sides of the hill." I ran into a set of letters written by Bal
Bhadra and others in their own hand which give the Nepalese side of story.
While they can not obviously be fully reproduced for reason of space, the
necessary aspects that give the Gorkha version are given below:90
 Attack by Gillespie. The Gorkhas could observe the movement of the
outflanking columns for attack on 30/31 October. Incredibly, it
resembles every detail of the build up, movement and deployment for
attack. The Gorkhas put British casualties at 8 Gora Sahibs including
one General. The actual casualties were: Officers-killed 5, wounded 18;
Others- killed 30, wounded 210. Among the senior Gorkha casualties
included Subedar Chandravir Thapa, Nathu Ram, Daljit Kumar and
Jamadar Daljit Shahi. They also included hundreds of men and their
families and the Garhwalis.
 Attack on 27-28. Extremely accurate information on build up to artillery,
manpower and deployment are given in these letters. They say Mush
or columns built up across Nagal, Dandagaon, Lashvan, Asthal,
89
BD Pande (Eng) PP 370-71.
Based on Captain Bal Bhadra's letter of December 1 of 1814; Ripu Darman Thapa's letter of December 4
and others, the manuscript of which are in the possession of the author.
90
80
Nalapani and water source. The guns were deployed on Table Land
(near wart source) and north end of the Fort. The attack developed
along the Table Land from where the battering guns breached the fort
wall. They also give details of British casualties including 40 killed and
348 wounded.
 Evacuation of Fort of kalunga. The authentic story of this evacuation
emerges from these letters. The evacuation of 84 men in fit condition
was carried out between the night of 27 November and 29 November in
three lots. ON night 27 November, 20 men with standards and treasury
moved out. This party was in charge of Ripudaraman Thapa. He had
four boxes full of jewellery and treasures to cart. He ahd some walking
wounded also placed under his charge for move to Srinagar. He halted
at Gopi Chand Ka Tippa during the nights of 28 and 29 November, 44
including Bal Bhadra finally vacated the fort. The withdrawal took them
to Srinagar and Nahan through the reinforcement companies on the top
and the Kiryali. But the withdrawl of Bal Bhadra was throuth the village
of Duwara to Chamba (or Chamuya) to Jauntgarh-Jaithak (Nahan).
 The veracity of the statement is further confirmed from the British side
as on 30 Npvember, on a tip off from locals, Ludlow moved and
attacked Bal Bhara's party. Besides killing a Gorkha officer and
wounding another Ludlow saw a Gorkha for the first time. The fear
Gorkhas had created amongst the British was what Japanese had done
to them in 1941-43. Besides they had only seen a Gorkha wounded
soldier who walked up to them for treatment to his fractured jaw. It
partially fits into the story produced by Edwin T Atkinson in the
Gazetteer of the Himalayan Districts (pp 639-640): "The seventy (in fact
84) who escaped from the Fort were soon after joined by some 300
others who had been hovering about the neighborhood endeavoring to
find a way into the fort …"
Re-inforcement
The letters also give the arrival of three companies from Nahan under
Subba Chandra Vir thapa. These included Jwala Dal, Ran Jang
companies. They concentrated on the high ground area of Kyarlie
(Kiayali) village and managed to infiltrate about half the strength into
the Fort. The letters give impression that Mlechha and Kalanal
companies had moved out with their standards. They were perhaps the
part of the troops who vacated the fort between 27 and 29 November.
81
Strength of Gorkhas in Kalunga. British records showed different
version of Gorkha strength at Kalunga which varies between 1,000 and
1,500. The actual strength, (though confirmed by Amar Singh Thapa)
can be worked out. Mawbey cremated 97 men and women on 1
December, he counted 90 already buried. The strength that vacated the
fort was 84, Re inforcement of 150 was built up. Even if an additional
number of 100 is given to it the strength does not go beyond 600. It
must be remembered that of this, atleast 200 were Garhwali fighters and
about 175 were the women and children.
Departing Scene. one of the letters of Bal Bhadra gives out his painful
departure and leaving behind the wounded. But he had told them that
the abandonment of the Fort by men who were fit to fight another day,
compelled him to vacate the Fort and leave them behind.
Concluding Lines
Mc Muun compares Kalunga with Chittor when he writes, " After
evacuation of the fort by Bal Bhadra it was like the scene of desolution
of Chittor in 1533 when 32,000 Rajputs including 13,000 in their flower
of Youth and beauty lay dead, through Jauhar and fight." The difference
lay only in one thing. Whereas the Rajputs sacrificed themselves more
due to fear of indignity, the Muslims would afflict to them, here in
Kalungas Gorkhas had inflicted defeat on their mighty foe and yet came
out dignified. They transcended the Rajput bravery.91
In the same context William Fraser passed the buck for failure on " The
heat, impatience and impetuosity of poor General Gillespie as the
principal cause of our defeat", But to the Gorkhas he was fair and said
of them in the same vein: "The Gorkhas fought most bravely and
91
Martial Races of India by Lieut Gen Mc Munn PP 86.
82
resolutely and if they fight as well in the field, we shall have tough
campaign".92
To Gillespie's blessed memory there is the tomb in Meerut, still in good
shape. The Indian Army takes pride in maintaining it. The marble slab
reads : "Vellore. Cornelles. Palumboung- Sir RR Gillespie. Djoc-Jocarta. 31 October 1814 Kalunga."
Out of Kalunga emerged the image of the Gorkha which is well
assessed by General Fredrick Young (also one who fought there), who
in his biography (pp44) wrote: "We may credit the tradition which says
that, on abandoning his stronghold Bulbudhur, the Ghoorkha Leonid
triumphantly exclaimed in the loud voice: To capture the Fort was a
thing forbidden but now I leave of my own accord. Kalunga was never
captured . It was entered when evacuated and then razed to the
ground". 93 And all that the British could find in the Fort beside the dead
and wounded, were 4 small brass and iron guns, 87 mounds of wheat,
109 mounds of paddy and some dal (pulses).94
The impression created by Bal Bhadra on his enemies was so indelible
and benign that Colonel Mawbey in his final report to Lord Moira wrote:
"It (the last defeat) is attributed to two causes: the first and principal of
which was the heroic devotion of the enemy who persisted in manning
the breach and bidding defiance to assailants … The second cause, the
steep descent … Bal Budder was a brave soldier and humane enemy."
In India Reveled: The arts and Adventure of james and William Fraser (1801-1835). This book is not for
sale in India.
92
Young's Biography: Three Hundred years in Innishowen .. An Account of Family of Young .. IN referring to
Bal Bhadra as leonid, Leonides or Leonide (pro-an-d-dez) he was symbolizing him with the radiance of a
shooting star constituting star constituting a meteoric shower that recurs near the 15 th November. Timewise
too Bal Bhadra's operations telescoped.
93
94
The details of rations and other recoveries are given at PRNW PP 502.
83
Out of these and several others rose the great tradition of the Gorkhas
who since 1814 have continued to hold the great title of the Bravest of
the braves.
Effects of Failure at Kalung
At the overall tactical level, the British accepted a sense of moral
ascendancy of the Gorkhas over their fighting élan. The Gorkhas could
not defeat them in the true sense of the word, but they damaged their
military psyche for years to come. At the strategic leval, it forced Moira
to abandon the planned advance to the capital of Garhwal and instead,
adopted a complementary hook in coordination with Ochterlony's to
Nahan. Capture of Virat and advance to Jaithak were a part of this
changed strategy.
And then the caution it posed and the delay it caused to the British
operations came out of it. The Divisions of Marley and Wood began to
advance on 15 November but these were the advance guards alone.
Their main bodies took their own time for one reason or the other. And
consequently what were designed to be "Kathamandu by Christmas".
became highly improbable. The overall effect of failure at Kalunga is
described by the Board of East India Company, comprising G Nugent,
NB Edmonstone and Arch Seton who wrote on 27 December 1814.
3. Your Humble Court will peruse with regret on account of the failure of
the second attempt to carry the fort of Kalunga by assault on 27
November and of the serious loss which was sustained on the
occasion. The result of the second attempt is considered by C-In-C to
be so serious and to effect so deeply the public interest and the
reputation of our arms. You will learn with satisfaction that three days
after the assault the enemy evacuated the fort .. ..95
95
The last report of the Board of East India Company is available in PRNW at PP 443.
84
Atkinson summed up the British feelings with perfect and objective
eulogy to Gorkhas of Bal Bhadra Kanwar as he wrote: " Whatever the
nature of the Gorkhalis may have been found in other quarters. there
was here no cruelty to wounded or to prisoners; no poisoned arrows
were used, no wells or waters were poisoned; no poisoned arrows
were used, no wells or waters poisoned; no rancorous spirit of revenge
seemed to animate them, they fought us in fair conflict like men and, in
the intervals of actual combat, showed us liberal courtesy worthy of
more enlightened people." He further goes on to describe the humanity
of the Gorkhas who, exhibited a strong sence of value of generosity and
courtesy in warfare and also of his duty to his country, separating
completely in his own mind private and national feelings from each
other and his frank confidence in the individual of our nation, from the
duty he owed his own, to fight against us, collectively. This was par
excellence.
No other enemy so humiliatingly defeated has raised a memorial for his
nemesis. This rare honour and distinction is only for Bal Bhadra and
His 600. It was qually in the words of GRC William to "palliate the
disgrace" of the British reverses.96
The Memorial (Dehradun)
The Memorial, now derelict, still stands on the right side of Road
Dehradun-Sahasradhara. It was here that Gillespie's headquarters was
located during the operations.
Two white obelisks side by side crown the left bank of Raspana Ravine
opposite Kalunga, one to the memory of Rollo Gillespie and those who
96
Memoirs of Dehra Dun by GRC Williams see British Rule in India PP 64.
85
perished with perished with him and the other a tribute to respect our
gallant adversary and his brave followers. It reads:
British Side
Maj Gen Sir Rollo Gillespie
Tps engaged
Lieut O' Hara 6th NI
Det Horse & Ft Arty
Lieut Gosling Lt Bn
100 Men 8th,Irish Dragoons
Ensign Fothergill 17th NI
HM's 53rd ; 5 Lt Coys
Ellis, Pioneers
1/6th NI, 1/7th NI
Capt Campbell 6th NI
1/13 NI; 1/17th NI
Lieut Luxford Horse Arty
7th Native Cav and Risala of
Cunnigham
Skinner's Horse
&NCOs & Men
Gorkha Side
This is inscribed as a tribute of respect for our gallant adversary
Bulbuddr, Commander of the fort and his brave Gorkhas who were after
wards while in service of Ranjit Singh, shoot down in their ranks to the
last man by Afghan Artillery.
On the highest point of the hill above this tomb stood the fort of
Kalunga. After two assaults on 31 October and 27the November…
86
Operations Against Nepal 1814-1815: The Grave- Yard Of British
Generals
"The British could not enter the man-made fort of Bharatpur. Our
mountains are impenetrable."
-Bhim Sen Thapa, Prime Minister of Nepal 1804-35.
An Ode To The Generals
Of Generals- the great British Generals,
Martindell, John Sullivan and George Wood.
Those assigned to capture Nepaul including Marley.
"Why fight?", said they "What could."
- best be obtained by parley
Grace be to their glory,
But it must be said,
As if in fable and,
Good interesting story.
The noble Generals of the British Army,
That went conquering 'Goorkas of Nepaul'.
Their battering guns with brass balls,
And they all etched their names into fame's hall.
With men forty thousands, elephants and battering guns,
87
They marched through the jungles and streams,
Where they sat over
Scotch and cream,
'Twas Jolly good picnic, 'nautch' and fun.
Then they again marched to jungle and mountain tops.
Marched down with lesser strength and flops,
Destroying villages and abandoned forts and crops,
And returned having fired great volleys and shots,
Feeling glady and thoroughly gay, Firing their salvos,
At poor Marquess of Hastings- Lord we pray,
Who fleeced the 'Naobab Wazeir" for their pay.
This is then story of these grand Generals,
Fabulous who created journals,
In support to protect their posterior,
And history of their motives, ulterior.
Strategy For Operations Against Nepal
Moira devised a strategy that looked 'Continental' in Asia. He wanted to
finish in one bold stroke the puny enemy as the Gorkhas were
derisively called then and whom his officers and political agents used
by different names: "barbarious but brave", 97 "the subject of a foreign
state holding land in the dominions of the British Government",98 "an
Ochterlony's letter at PRNW, PP 275. The note read:"The Governor General has not overlooked the
inconvenience for the subject of the foreign state (Nepal) holding land in the dominions of the British
Government."
97
98
Moira's letter of 8 August 1815.
88
Asiatic Army with no gegular base, or transport, where each warrior
carried his food, his kit (such as it is), his ammunition in this person
and when he is defeated, he makes the best of his way to home and
sets to tilling his filed".99
There are several aspects of the military operations that we saw in the
causes of the war. They needed to be dovetailed into the overall
strategy Moira evolved and the military plan he made. The assumptions
that he made were based on material superiority and the British ability
to disintegrate the Gorkha alliance and the overall superiority his force
enjoyed visa-vis the Nepalese. His intelligence sources estimated an
overall strength of the Gorkha armed men not in excess of 10,000 with
flint-locked inferior weapons and a few hundred 2 inch and 3 inch
cannons of doubtful capability, as against this he expected to march
with about 45,000 to 50,000 regulars, with about the same number of
Irregulars a cavalry that would envelop the Gorkha defences, an artillery
that would hurl heavy shells and shots form distant places, a European
and Native Infantry that would deliver coup de' grace in quick order.
Then there would be a vast logistical base, that coped with the
operations as they progressed.
The economics of the war was the next, he assumed to be favouring
him. There were "Treasures", as he called the Nawab of Lucknow
(Oudh) and others under his protection like Raja of Patiala, who would
raise the funds and 'barkandawzs' to fight the war to its end without
draining the funds of the Company, or causing severe man power
shortages. The Gorkhas in comparison were taken as paupers and
incapable of raising more than a few thousand rupees.
The game of alliance, however strange bed-fellows they made, was the
next factor he assumed to swing in his balance. Though temptations,
bribery, reprisals and treaties with Sikhas, hopes of restoration of Rajas
and of "a noble rule of law", they, the British, had already begun to gain
99
Remarked by Field Marshal Roberts of Kandhar many years later as C-in-Indian Army 1889-95.
89
the favor of an ill-informed public and the selfish Rajas whose sole
cause and consequence of war was their personal aggrandizement. The
British understood that they had become a "biddable people", as
Hamilton called them.100
The divided lots of the Durbaris in Kathmandu, the ill-tereatment Bam
Shah and even Amar Singh received at the hands of the Thapas at the
Durbar, the intense Thapa-Pande feuds in Kathamandu and a general
state of poverty among the Gorkha troops were the next set of factors
that gave convocation to Moira's assumption of prevalence of low
morale amongst the Gorkha troops, that his forces would fight. He
thought they would cave in by the mere size of the British juddernaut.
So, therefore, he divised a military strategy of broad front, short intense
war to "chastise the Gorkha" in Nepal and India by the Christmas of
1814. His plan, as we saw, was a widely separated four pronged
offensive with flanking operations.
100
See Chapter on Gorkha Administration in Occupied Territories.
90
Marley's Quest For Watered Down Operations And his Desertion
The operations in the west were marked with a high degree of zeal in
collecting intelligence, subverting the loyalty of old rulers and Quislings
like Harsh Dev Joshi, bribery and hollow promises to the locals. They
had employed every source to gain intelligence to the maximum. It was
a splendidly stage- managed show. And also, the objectives in the west
were modest, well-measured and easily achievable. In the east, on the
other hand, the objectives envisaged were ambitious, for whom
intelligence were sadly lacking. The British had neither acquired good
terrain going maps nor employed any worthwhile effort in feeding
intelligence even when the operations got going. The agencies that the
British trusted were shaky and they abandoned them at the slightest
pretext. Information based on the reports of Colonel Kirkpatrick, though
two decades old were tightly controlled and in any case, obsolescent
and the British were much at loss to correctly evaluate the Gorkha
strength in Nepal and their likely reactions.
So confused were the British about the Gorkha capabilities that Moira's
directions to the Divisional commanders and the two flanking
operational commanders i.e., Gardner (Kumaon) and Latter (Sikkim)
were only general in nature. What, however, took precedence over
strategic intelligence and operational requirements were the political
arrangements which might or might not support the military operations.
Undue importance was given to solicit support of " Raja Udai Practap
Sigh, ex Raja of Makwanpur, Raja Tej Pratap Singh of Tanhue";
"endeavour to effect the overthrow of the power of Bhim Sen Thapa and
deposition of the Raja of Nepal "; and, "subversion of Gorkhas in Nagri
(Sikkim)" 101
Such arrangements therefore, lacked the hard and reliable information
for planning ground operations by both Wood and Marley. Their plans
101.
Political Arrangements PRNW, PP 267-268.
91
were, at best, based on hearsay, speculations and little wonder, they
went attacking in the euphemistic thin air.
Marley's task was to occupy Hetouda (or, Hetoura) and capture the forts
of Hariharpur and Makwanpur before proceeding to Kathmandu. He was
given wide flexibility on his axis of advance between Rivers Rapti and
Bagmati a 30-40 miles wide corridor, at its narrow limits.
His force comprising the Indian and the European artillery (868), HM's
24th/41st Wales (907), the three Indian battalion (1/8 NI, 1/12 NI, 1/25 NI,
and two Granadiers and Light Companies alongwith a Pionner
Company (276) totaled 7,989. An array of guns, howitzers and mortars
made the ordnance that would support his operations and included 2,
18 pounder battering guns; 4, 6 piunders; 8, 42/5 Howitzers; 4, 3
piunders; and 2, 42/5 inch Mortars, 51/2 inch Mortars and 8 inch
Howitzers each. (figures in bracket showing the strength)102
While issuing out directions to Marley on 6, November 1814 the
commander-in-Chief had emphasized: "The service now entrusted to
you is of particularly important nature. We are now about to engage in
hostilities with a new power whose insolence and aggression have
defied us to arms. The maintenance of the established renown of our
country in Asia, the future wars of similar character will greatly depend
on a speedy and successful issue to the approaching conest. Of all the
operation in progress against Napaul none can more effectually
contribute towards bringing such an issue than the accomplishment of
important honorable part assigned to you in the general plan…. The
expectation which the C-in-C and the Government entertain of success
is high; an expectation which HE feels confident will not be
disappointed"103 It was also said that the C-in-C had formed the highest
102
Ibid PP 701
103
PRNW, 214-215.
92
expectation of a brilliant and rapid termination of war from Marley's
operations.
The rest of the instructions played on his 'elan, dash and ability to
manage the war. As the C-in-C felt that the Nepalese had sought the
Chinese assistance, Marley was instructed that he should not suspend
the operation; "whatever opposes you in the field must be considered
as a Gorkha force…". and if confronted by the Chinese they could be
told that the British were on "punitive other than acquisitive," mission
in Nepal.104
Marley planned to raise an Irregular battalion but could not muster one
in time. His planning involved movement upto the Nepal border on the
terrain by a force strong enough to drive in the Gorkhas operating in
the area north to Tirhut to the border and then make a determined
advance to Makwanpur-Hariharpur. It involved establishing a large firm
base on the home side of the border and thence advancing astride the
axes leading on to Makwanpur-Hariharpur. The operations are
explained on the sketch.
An initial firm base was planned and was obtained under Lieut Colonel
Paris Bradshaw, the Political Agent and Major Roughedge, who moved
with a considerable force of more than 1,500 including a squadron of
Gardner's Irregular's Cavalry and 3,6 pounders, By November-end,
posts had been established from Prasa in the west to Bharharwa, the
second after a bitter clash with the Nepalese commander Paras Ram
Thapa. It resulted in the Nepalese losing 78 killed and 28 prisoners
along with their Vakil Chandra Sekhar Upadhyaya.
Marley moved slowly to forward assembly area south of Bharharwa and
waited for the battering train of the 18 pounders that had been ordered
104
Quoted by Hasrat at PP 268 from The Campbell Sketch.
93
from Kanpur. They built up only a week before the Christmas. The
battering train arrived at Lauton about the time when the Gorkhas were
planning a reposte on the build up of the British.
On the ground, however the junior leaders (Captains Sibley and
Blakney) assigned with the task of expanding the firm base had moved
with boldness. With a disdain for the Gorkha capability which had been
inspired from the easy success at Bharharwa under Major Roughedge,
Captains Sibley and Blackey failed to adopt adequate defensive
measures at Parsa and Samanpur, which they had occupied without
resistance. On December 31 and January 1, the attack developed
against them as given in the sketch. IN the din of the confusion there
were only two gunners Lieut Matheson and Matross William Levy who
fought till end. The History of Bengal Artillery records their bravery:
"Lieut Matheson fought his one gun as long as he had ammunition.
Matross William Levy, who, though wounded by a musket shot through
one leg and one arm, yet gallantly continued to keep his station till the
priming pouch was blown from his side, and his wounds. becoming too
painful to endure, obliged him to sit down; and Silari, a gun lascar of
the 42nd Company, who though wounded in both hand and foot
continued along to assist Lieut Matheson to the last, and who seized
and carried away with a silver spear, which the enemy planted close to
the gun." 105
The casualties suffered by these two posts i.e., Parsa and Samanpur
rose to 383-almost those suffered at the capture of Malaun. These
shook Marley.
The Nepalese commander who swept these two posts also carried toe
guns which continue to be displayed in the Royal Museum at
Kathmandu.106
105
The History of Bengal Artillery, PP 26, 27.
106
Perceval Landon confirm it so in his book Nepal (Vol I) 1928 (PP 264)
94
The events of failure in the west had also begun to influence the
judgement of the commanders of the east. If Ochterlony could get over
the inertia that had set in at Nehr in December, it was the energetic
hands of his allies, the compactness of the area of his operation and
the most reliable intelligence of Amar Singh he built through the
intercepted mail. The Irregulars too helped him. In the case of Marley
and as we will see even of Wood It was not so. The area of operation
and the most reliable intelligence of Amar Singh he built through the
intercepted mail. The Irregulars too helped him. In the case of Marley
and as we eill see even of Wood it was not so. The area of operation law
over a vast track over a terrain easily described as difficult, whose
every mile would be contested by the Gorkhas for the defence of their
country. Marley was watching it and became extra-cautious. The events
of the New Year furter dampened his sprits.
The Gorkhas had selected their time of counter-attack ideally as during
tthat period the British were known to be busy with their Christmas and
New-Year celebrations. They expected lesser degree of vigilance in the
forward posts. And it proved correct, as on 31 December when
Shamsher Rana and Sarbjit Thapa attacked, they found both the posts
lightly manned and their reactions sluggish. They were routed.
Its result was not only to effect Marley but those who had become allies
of convenience, and strange bed-fellows. Raja of Bettiah's 1,000
Irregulars, who had been raised with difficulty, revolted .The Zamindars
of the area, aware of the Gorkha wrath, until now sitting on the fence,
weaned off their support, at least temporarily. 107
The second effect which plagued Marley under the circumstance could
portend self-imposed otacle to offensive. Like all his counter-partsm
not sure of outcome of their operations, he began to "over-estimate"
the Gorkha strength and capabilities opposite him; it had grown over
the period of confrontation, about ten times more than earlier predicted.
Despite this swollen strength of 10,000, he argued, his fighting strength
107
Pemble, 224.
95
was "inadequate" to beat the enemy. He demanded a reasonable
supporting ration of two, if not three, to assure success.
He did not, however give up the mission; he only suggested a "
Watering down" of his objective. Not Kathmandu. He told the Governor
General to limit his final objective to Makwanpur. Alongwith that also
went the demand for additional troops.108
Moira had already denuded all his cantonments in Bihar and Bengal of
their strengths and built up Marley's force to a staggering strength of
12,000. The accretion to Marley's Division was brought about by
diverting HM's 17th from the Gorkhpur Division, which gave him two
Eurepean Infantry battalions, ten companies of Grenadiers and an extra
battalion of Native Infantry from Tirhut. He also asked the British settler
in the area to help Marley. Earlier, a large column of elephants had
been coerced to be provided by the Wizir of Oudh to supports his
logistic.
But there was that great but-bear, the dread of the Gorkhas which made
him drag his feet. The History of Bengal Artillery records it:
"Though reinforced to a strength of 12,000 men and urged to action by
the frequent letters of his Commander-in-Chief, he could come to no
decision in his own mind but one, that he carried out … Histories tell of
armies running away from their General's but there is on record of a
General running away from his army, as General Marley did.. Oppressed
by a sense of responsibility which he could not bear, he left camp
(located at Binjara Pokhara) before daylight on the 10th February
without notifying his intention, or making over his office to any one". 109
108
109
PRNW, PP 278.
Also see The History of Bengal Artillery PP 29.
96
Moira himself recorded his personal disgust of Marley; his report of 2
August 1815:
256. Marley uniformly formed the resolution of not advancing until he
should be joined by the battering train which could not reach Bettiah
until December.
257. It is impossible for me to acquit Marley of the gross neglect of
taking measures of reducing the strength of them (Parsa and
Samanpur..)
262. The number of enemy's strength calculated and easily blowed far
excess of the enemy's population.
Moira's dream of taking his battle into the heart of Nepal failed by the
abortive action of Marley. Colonel Sandes remarked of Marley's
operation and his sack from command: "It was pitiful exhibition of
irresolution and incompetence… under him fire-eating leaders (were)
forced to remain inactive.."110
Captain B Latter who provided the eastern flank protection to Marley's
operations by advancing to Morung and inciting uprisings against the
Gorkha in Sikkim, felt dejected. In his 4 February 1815 letter he wrote:
"It is subject of great regret to me that retrograde movement of General
Marley's Amry renders it totally impracticable to afford any assistance
to Sikkim Raja in his attempt on Nagree.
Poor Marley ! Most historians wanted to strip him off his insignia of
General's rank, some out of disdain, others for the heck of it. Francis
110
PNRW, Moira's Report of 2 August 1815.
97
Tuker in Gokrha: The sotry of the Gurkhas of Nepal (PP 80-81) found
him 'compressed' under the weight of responsibility. And yet, despite
his failure and desertion Marley was allowed to remain in service as
Commandant of the Allahabad garrison. He died as a full General at
Barrackpure on 14 June 1842-full 27 years later.
His one time Gorkha opponent, Bhagat Sigh, according to the British
sources The History of Artillery PP 29 foot note) with similar acts of
inertia, was said to have been paraded in petticoat in the Durbar !
The fact of Marley's removal need nevertheless to be put in right
perspective. Moira, was not happy in sending him as a force
commander, in the first instance. He had Major General George Wood,
Marley's junior, in mind of the task but could not afford to supersede
him for a field command. And when he came up with the suggested
'watered down' objective, he , at once decided to replace him before it
was too late. It is only to be inferred that Marley left his command under
total depression caused by his inability to accept the challenge of
command and mobilize it more vigorously form attack on Nepal. To top
it up, the news of his replacement obviously must have further
depressed him. The British history is silent in putting on record the
version of Marley anywhere which could clarify the position.
In the larger analysis, it was system failure on two accounts: the failure
of the C-in-C to pickup the right type of the commander out of those
available rather than assign important responsibility purely by the merit
of seniority; and secondly, lack of confidence which Marley had in his
command was really an endemic problem of that time. In the first case,
mediocrity rather than meritocracy was the rule and in the second, the
General Officers were picked up at the last minute to command
division, of which they knew nothing but which they would soon lead
into war. It was a total confusion worst confounded. Some of them who
succeeded, had either served these formations earlier or were just
plucky and even lucky.
98
The Meandering George Wood
Major General George Wood who took over (from Marley), did not
consider it suitable to take unnecessary risks. The miserable state of
the force, its morale shaken, the coming summer, and the monsoon, the
malaria to which local Tharus of the Terai alone were immune and not
his troops, served his purpose of procrastination.
But in order to cover himself, he began to interpret the new order Moira
had passed to him for being speedily executed: "advance to
Makwanpur". Not sure of himself, he queried Moira, "in view of
advanced malarial weather, the objective should be, clearing the
Gorkhas from Terai". This brought Moira's fury, as expected. Major
General George Wood, humorously known to the British officers as
"Tigher", was proving a jackal, if not a lamb. Moira's letter castigated
him squarely as he fired his salvo from Calcutta: "When you were
substituted for Major General Marley professedly that you might repair
the mischief entailed by his inactivity I should have thought an
unworthy impeachment of your character …" He told him of a recent
success of the Irregular Cavalry; and by diverting HM's 17th Foot, into
his Division, his hands had already been strengthened. And he should
act quickly. " I should have lamented that you saw cause to forego what
appeared a most advantageous opportunity…nothing of this sort is
even the most remotely intimated by you … Do not deceive yourself.
You neglecting to give me, your C-in-C, satisfaction on that point was
no venial oversight. It was substantially culpable .. My selection of you
for the command manifested, my opinion of your character and my
personal dispositions towards you. I must not, however suffer my
partialities of betray me into a parley with insubordination. I desire you
as a soldier to say conscientiously how as you General ought to act in
the case which I have detailed to you".111
111
Military Engineers IN India by Sandes, PP 239.
99
It spurred George Wood to move at last. He struck down his camp at
Binjara Pokhara on 3 march, 1815, moved to Baragarhi which Colonel
Randhir Singh of the Gorkhas, fighting his mobile defence, had vacated
in favour of the defence of Hetaura. Roughedge destroyed the post.
From here George's juggernaut moved to Saran by 9 March and thence
to Janakpur. It was a combing operation of which he said, he had swept
the eastern Gorkha territory.
And then he moved back to Bettiah and called off the campaign, as it
was no more clinically possible to maintain the health of the troops
engaged in operation. The impression he gave of himself to his
command was that Cornet Hearsey of the Gardner's Horse called, "
disagreeable and incapable old General".112
In no further mood to forgive their Divisional Commanders, HM's 24th
(or 24th /41st Royal Regiment of Wales) recorded their opinion of the two
Generals, Bennet Marley and George Wood which its history recorded:
"The 24th had the misfortune to be posted to the easternmost Division
commanded by General Marley (and George Wood) who were not noted
either for energy or initive ..". The Battalion blamed its own indifferent
contribution to the war squarely on its Generals' incompetence. On
George wood, they wrote specifically: "Having led his 24th, and Indian
battalions on a hundred-mile trudge to no purpose other than burning a
few abandoned Gurkha stockades, he retried to a camp near Bettiah".113
It was the total disgust of the troops, who are silent yet are the best
judge of their commander and Generals. The British troops did not
mince their words. Nor did the contemporary historian Penderal Moon
who remarked mildly "Marley was unnerved by reports of the Gorkhas
112
Enclosure with Moira's Narrative of War, letter of 2 August 1815, (PRNW, PP 718)
Incompetence or irretrievable damages in war had resulted in removal of the senior Military commanders
all over the world. In World War II, Wavell, Auchinleck and others had been removed BM Kaul became a
casualty in the 1962 India-China war. In operation Desert-Storm, the US Air Force commander was sacked
for a small aberration. Often military commanders have become scape-goat for failures of the politicians.
113
100
fighting qualities and by wild estimates of their numbers. Then of
February 10 oppressed by sense of his incompetence, he suddenly,
without warning and without handing over to any of subordinate, rode
out of camp and left his army to look after itself."114
George Wood, the 'Tiger' in hibernation at Bettiah remained in
command. He was to deploy his troops in the Terai providing David
Ochterlony a larger firm base for his second invasion of Nepal.
John Sullivan Wood Goes Pegging
The Division under command Major General John Sulivan Wood was to
advance to Butwal-Palpa with a view "to recover the Terraie of Bootwul
and Sheoraj and afterwards to menace the enemy's frontier, creating a
diversion in favour of the division advancing on Catmandoo, and of
penetrating, if practicable, the hills, so as to occupy Palpa and Tonsein,
the principal station and depot of the Goorkha in that quarter… After
securing these objects, the further movements of this division is to be
regulated by circumstances."
George Sullivan Wood's Division, as seen, was given as difficult a task
as indeed to Marley operating further east. To enable him to carry out
his task General Wood was allotted a fairly balanced force, that
comprised : 8th Native Cavalry (Gardner's Horse); 5th Company 2nd
Battalion and 3rd Company 3rd battalion Artillery with of Pioneers along
with a large number of followers and logistics commissariat. The
combatants themselves mad about 5,000. Their details:
Eighth Regiment Native Cavalry
(Later Gardner's Horse).
114
Quoted from Pemble, PP 241.
- 114
101
Artillery, European and Native
- 457 2,18 pdrs
8/6 pdrs
5th company 2nd Battalion later 3rd company- 3,4 2/5
3rd Battalion added.
in mors
2,4 2/4
in Hows
European Infantry (His Majesty's Seventeenth) – 958
Native Infantry
- 2,875
Pioneers (8th Company Bengal Pioneers).
- 90
Total
- 4,494
It is necessary to clarify that the language of Directive led to
ambiguities and interpretations that became partly responsible for the
failure of the operations. When the going got tough, the Generals found
the ambiguities of orders as excuse for the achievement-short-falls.
There is little of a divisional size operations in this sector except that
Wood had a skirmish at Jitgarh, that dominated the western flank of
Butwal-Sheoraj areas and over them, the axis leading to Palpa. And as
failure came too easy, the operation became one of wild-goose chase
by the General. First to look for another avenue of advance the
subsequently, reacting to the Gorkha actions and rumours.
The chronological development of events of November 1814 February
1815, when constant, though disparagingly show movements took
place are below:
102
 The advanced guard troops under Captain Heathcote and
Lieutenant Anderson commenced on 15 November, established
the firm base by capturing the areas of Mynri (Myanri), Lotan and
Nichaul-Pali. It was a good going and gave a flexible and suitable
area for the main division to take off.
 Under the then reliable guidance of the former Prime Minister of
Palpa Kanaknidhi Tewari, Wood planned to march to Siura-JitgarhNiakot- with a view to bypass Butwal defence and brushing aside
the minor opposition on this axis and assault Palpa from a lesser
guarded flank.
Kanaknidhi, beside having remained a Prime Minister of Palpa, was a
scholar and had helped Francis Hamilton Buchnan compile An
Account of the Kingdom of Nepal and of the Territories Annexed To
This Dominion By The House of Gorkhas (Published 1819). He was
credited with good knowledge of the ground and because he had
avowed to avenge the death of the Raja of Palpa Killed by Bhim Sen
Thapa in 1806, he had joined the camp of the Firingis invading Nepal.
He was, in a small measure, a 'Harsh Dev' of Nepal.
Like Harsh Dev Joshi in Kumon, Raja of Nalagarh and other who helped
Ochterlony, Tewari agreed to lead the main force up the hill train, he
had recommended to Wood and which the latter had accepted. Moving
at a snail's pace, Wood's force of about 10,000 including the followers
and porters, snaked up the road to Siura where it encamped. HM's 17th
Foot under Colonel Hardyman, led the advance, on 15 December when
it moved cross-country. As the force arrived at Siura on 1 January
Randhir Singh's column commanders Shamsher Rana and Sarbjit
Thapa opposed them.115
By 3 January Kanaknidhi led the King's troops opposite Jitgarh Fort, its
magnificently camouflaged and almost concealed stockade from view.
It is here the HM's 17th and other in the advance, bore the brunt of the
Gorkha ferocity. They, in fact, ran into a well laid gauntlet of fire. Within
115
From History of the Family of Hearsays.
103
hours, Captain Hiat, the Brigade major was wounded, and Lieut
Morrison having been wounded, succumbed to his injuries. Other
casualties included 19 killed and 100 wounded. It also included a shell
grazing to General wood. The enemy was thought to have almost three
times casualties, though it was not even one tenth. But defenders of the
stockade retreated to the Fort after inflicting casualties. Kanaknidhi too
was killed in the melee, whose body was disposed off by Birbhanjan,
before he allowed the British to collect their.116
The Fort commander, according to the Nepalese sources, was
Birbhanjan Pande; though the British were told it was Wazir Singh.
What actually happened here, notwithstanding the British claim to
having and overpowered the stockade, was the taste of a Khukri charge
by Birbhanjan Pande against the HM's 17th and others. This pinned
down Wood's attacking force.
One of the most dreaded fall-outs of Kalaunga, Jaithak and Ramgarh in
the west was the terror of the Khukri wielding Gorkhas in full cry as
pack of wolves. That reputation was, until then, intact and showing its
full effect in the east. Wood was shaken-up through he still called it a
reconnaissance. But he passed the blame for failure at the stockade
quickly to Tewari's treachery in misleading him. Prinsep remarked with
the advantage of hindsight and tutoring by the Governor General: "The
manoeuvre produced no result though attended with several
casualties". 117
The main defences of the Fort on this day (3 January 1815) were intact.
After consultation with Hardyman and others, Wood quickly
appreciated, he would need much larger a force to tackle them and he
became "determined to stop the fruitless waste of lives by sounding the
Regimental History of 24th /41 PP 88 interestingly, the motto of this Regiment was akin to the Gorkhas'
motto, both meaning rather death than be dishonoured.
116
117
Moon, PP 378-79.
104
retreat". Unfortunately like Marley and later George Wood, Sullivan
Wood had neither good advisers nor could he himself remain
"determined" to fulfil his mission, failures and blockages,
notwithstanding. In case of both the Woods and Marley it was failure to
"maintain the aim", as the Twentieth Centure military doctrine finally
came to accept as the first and foremost principle of war.
As he vacillated, Wood, in an attempt to reconnoiter another avenue
moved to Surajpur but stopped short of Tulsipur, on the western flank.
He then retreated, changed his axis 180 degree out of phase and arrived
at Bansi by 3 February. The pressure having been released from the
Gorkhas, it was their turn to make bolder moves into Terai. They
swooped to Tulsipur, Myanri, Siura, Pali, and down to Nichlaul in the
east. Even Lotan was forced to be vacated, under the Gorkha
Juggernaut.
Wood now made a north-easternly move to Sheoraj- the aweful place as
he called it- to follow the tricks of a Ghenghis Khan and Nadir Shah. He
destroyed the crops. encouraged his troops to pillage the hamlets and
within 12 days he claimed to have destroyed 200 villages. The
megalomaniac in John Sullivan Wood satisfied, he then thought of
doing the same at Butwal but the extra-caution in him stopped when a
small attacking force was caught crossing the Tenavi. He called off the
whole operation.
General Wood's attacking force was back at Gorakhpur, form where it
had started two months earlier. The image of the superior force
"determined to chastise the Gorkhas" was fissured. Wood was sacked
by the Governor General without remorse or fanfare. He in fact offered
his resignation, but was sent to England, where, like Marley he too died
a full General, the last of his honour being the Governor of Tower of
London, an appointment that is customarily given to Generals whose
services are immaculate, distinguished, and rewardable.
105
The stigmas Marley and John Sullivan Wood received from their
pusillanimous acts in evading the main tasks assigned to them, were
perhaps washed away by Moira's own not too clean a record of this
operation and more-. In 1823 he had to resign for financial bungling he
had done in Hyderabad. The British system of justice had finally caught
up with his misdemeanour and similar swindling off the Wizir of Oudh,
whom he asked to finance his Anglo-Gorkha as a loan !
As Moira's leadership suffered, the British prestige at its nadir,
emboldened not only Bhim Sen Thapa and his grinning Gorkhas but he
would tell Moira that the Convention which he forced on Bam Shah and
Amar Singh, were fraudulent which he will contest, politically and
militarily. Had there been an organization like the United Nations,
perhaps Bhim Sen would have sought it's help !
Nearer home, no one was impressed with either the British modern
army or their ability to defeat a brave enemy like the Gorkhas. The
subversion and fraud they used in Kumaon and the Punjab Hill States
could not take them far into the Nepalese main land. It was this
frustration Moira reflacted in his remarks to Colonel Nicholls, the Hero
of Almora, through a General Order of the day:118
The success of Colonel Nicolls under the complicated difficulties
presented by the country, the fortification by which the natural strength
was assisted, and the obstinate resistance of a courageous enemy,
should prove the superiority conferred by military science and a
certainty that strenuous application of its principle must entail
honourable distinction on a commander… It is only in unusual
situations demanding readiness of resource and animated efforts that
the difference between officer and officer can be displayed. And it
ought to be always present to the mind of ever military man that he who
tries and fails had to plead those chances from which no operation in
118
PRNW, PP 712.
106
war can be secured; while he who contedts himself with urging
difficulties, registers his own inefficiency (author's emphasis).
As happens in war, the Gorkhas symbolized third battle of Jitgarh-small
and insignificant as it was as their important battle that prevented the
British in 1815 from aggression against the main land. It was, in fact, an
overall failure for Lord Moira; and the Gorkhas turned their border as
de-facto Laxman Rekha, proving their hills impenetrable.
Effects of the First Campaign: An Analysis
"It is often outside the power of the General to act as he would have
liked owing to lack of adequate resources and I think military history
seldom brings this out. In fact, it is almost impossible without a detailed
study which is often unavailable. For instance, if Hannibal had another
twenty elephants, it might have altered his whole strategy against Italy."
-Lord AP Wavell in a letter in a letter to BH Liddel hart, 1942.
It is intended to discuss the implication of the aftermath of the first
campaign, briefly. Moira never expected Gorkhas to capitulate so
quickly after situation turned so dismal in November-December 1814
and continued to remain so, on the fronts of three fourth of his force.
The avalanche of the Gorkha defeat and the landslide of the British
victories at Almora and Malaun turned the British extra generous,
magnanimous to a limit that they let Gorkhas march off with honour.
They realized their folly, when the Durbar began to refuse to ratify and
Convention which Amar Singh and Bam Shah had signed in April-May.
A second campaign thus became necessary to accept the ratification of
the Convention. The government of the day in London and later the
historians blamed Moira for showing extra generosity to the Gorkhas.
Philip Mason, for example, wrote: "With the advantage of hindsight the
Gorkha war was prolonged because we released Amar Singh Thapa
107
when he surrendered".119 It is doubtful if the Durbar at Kathmandu
could have made efforts to retrieve Amar Singh and his force, if the
British took them as prisoners. Even if it were to be so, the line of
defences extending from Jaithak into Garhwal was still intact and it
could have taken the British, the best part of the following year to carry
on the struggle. In any case, the failure in the east justified Moira's
action. Besides, he constantly feared that the strategic support from the
Chinese and Nepalese alliance with the Marathas and Sikha could well
have sprung another surprise for the British.
Abandoning an empire of 45,000 square miles of the occupied territory
by the Nepalese was the matter of great pain to Amar Singh who rightly
called it as having been built "over four generations of acquisition,
dignity and dominion".120 The British too reasised that rubbing the
Gorkhas beyond a point was not in their interest. Moira made the point
clear when he wrote: "The procrastination of the Gorkhas in concluding
a treaty is not to be wondered at. The subscribing to the loss of half
their empire is a painful submission of a proud people." 121 Commenting
on the situation HH Dodwell thought that the series of defeats of the
British at the hands of the Gorkhas "Spread widely in the country and
offered no small encouragement to the Peshwas. Ochterlony alnoe
restored the lost prestige of his nation". 122 Similar was the observation
of Moira who wrote in his diary "Ameer Khan (of the Pindari) has in his
camp 30,000 fighting men, 125 pieced of cannons. it is clear that he is
waiting in the hope of untoward events occurring to us in the Nepalese
war; an expectation founded on the extravagant opinion, they entertain
of the Gorkha power and the reverses we have already suffered in the
context."123
119
Nepalko Sainik Itihas, PP 420 and PRNW, PP 524.
Birbhanjan is said to have told he British: " I have issued orders to my victorious troops not to molest your
wounded men but any aggression will be severely punished". And of Kanaknidhi, Wood had written, " If he is
with the enemy I have no dubt of his treachery".
120
121
Wood's report at PRNW, PP 524 India no doubt of history of Bengal Artillery PP 25.
From Article " The Operation Leading To Capture of Almora In 1815" by JC Powell-Price (obtained from
the Gurkha Museum Winchester, England).
122
123
A Matter Of Honour: An Account Of the Indian Army. Its Officers And Men by Philip Mason.
108
Penderal Moon saw it in winder perspective and with an objectivity,
rarely visible among the British historians except Edward Bishop. "The
overall setback of the British and their defeats at Kalunga and Jaithak,
the timidity of General Wood and desertion of General Marley had
shaken the British self-confidence and gave rise to their enemies, wide
hopes of strengthening their arms to drive them out. The Marathas,
Scindias, Holkars and Peshwas, Amir Khan, the Nizam and Ranjit singh
were unanimous in their design-though not united to do so. The Gorkha
bravery and resistance sent waves of jubilation all over India nad
indeed, sensation."124
Moon based his observations only on what Amar Singh Thapa had
written in his letter of 2 March 1815. "If succeed", Amar Singh had said,
" and Ranjore Singh with Jaspau Thapa and his officers prevail at
Jaithak, Ranjit Singh will rise against the enemy. In conjunction with
Sikhs, my army will descend into the plains, recover Dun; when we
reach Haridwar, Nawab of Lucknow will take part in the cause."125 But
do we not see lack of unity and vision among the Indians as their
prominent failure ? These two had already become the cause of their
earlier subjugation to the Muslims and the oncoming one to the
English.
Sir Charles Metcalfe chastised the military for failure of intelligence
estimates, as he wrote, " Before we came to contest, their power of
resistance was ridiculed. Their forts are said to be contemptible, their
arms are described as useless. Yet we find on the trial, they can deal
out death among their assailants and stand to their defences". The
Gorkhas had tought a lesson to the British, which nobody had so far
done. And then the British began trumpeting the Saga of the true
bravery of the Gorkhas. In Metcalfe's words:
124
Original letter of Amar Singh Thapa is kept in India Officer Library.
125
In moira's report of 2 Ausgust 1815.
109
We had never met with an enemy who showed decidedly more bravery
and greater streadiness than our troops possess; it is imposible to say
what may be the end of such a reverse of order of things. In some
instance our troops. Europeans and Native, have been repulsed by
inferior numbers with sticks and stones. In others, our troops have
been charged by enemy sword in hand and driven for miles like a flock
of sheep. In this war, we have numbers on our side and skill and
bravery on the enemy side." He made the British command see the
writing on the wall as he suggested. " Our power in India rests upon our
military superiority. It has no foundation in the affections of our
subjects. It cannot derive support from the good will or good faith of
our neighbors."
This very truth prevailed in India till 1946. The first campaign maimed, if
not killed the myth of the British military superiority in India. They
proved no match for the Gorkha bravery, the bravery of men of hills,
who beat them in an alien land, far off form their own home land.
Surrounded by allies-turned-enemy and fence-sitters, yet their bravery
saw the day. It caused anxiety and fears to Moira, who agreed with
Metcaffe that "to be failed in the struggle with the Gorkhas would be the
first step to a speedy subversion of our power." By the end of 1815 he
was all out for another confrontation-in order to reduce the lost
prestige. And the stratagems he used were desperate.
I began the theme of operations in the East as "Graveyard of the British
Generals". It turned out so not necessarily due to the lack of
competence, mediocrity or a new battlefield milieu that the AngloGorkha war offered. It was, in large sum, due to the psychological
imbalance of most of the British Generals. They were not just attuned to
fighting war, or even managing its complex character, which as
Ochterlony realized and, called for "genius" in a man. The Gorkha
commanders, on the other hand, bereft of a finesse were one who had
known the face of the battle many a time and were mentally prepared to
fight it out. If only resources matched their valour, they would have
ruled Asia !
110
Psychology, has over the centuries rightly assumed important factor in
selection, training and nurturing of military commanders. It took the
British a century more to appreciate it.
111
Kumaon: A Burden Of History: Without Almora There Could Not Have
Been A Malaun
Before the establishment of Almora town, the Katyuri Raja Baichaldev
(whose capital was in Askot), gave it to a Gujrati Bhahmin. The
development of Almora was done only by the Chands who made places
for themselves and permitted habitation. They named it as Rajapur.
Towered by the mountains Kalimath, (6,414 fet), Shimtola (6,066 feet)
and the massif of the Gannath, it is a beautiful town that has human life
in the lap of nature.126
The Gorkhas, who occupied it from 1790 did little improvement to the
town except re-building the Lalmandi fort, improving the Gannath
temple and turning the are of Sitoli into a fortress. This has now been
taken over as an establishment of Ministry of Defence. On capture on
Almora in April 1815, the British re-designated Lal Mandi as Fort Moira
and made it as the Headquarters of Kumaon Commissionary from
where they began to control both Kumaon and Garhwal. Owing to the
topographical similarities, cultural consonance, and political
expediency, the idea of an integrated state of Uttrakhand demonstrates
the historical feelings of the people of the region of Garhwal and
kumaon.127
Without dwelving further into history we move to re-capitulate the plan
of offensive against Gorkhas by the British in 1814. The 1st Division
under Major General Marley had been given the task of seizing the pass
Hyder Young Hearsey was an Eurasian of the Hearsey family. He was trained by General M Perron who
served with Scindias. An active adventurer who traveled to Tibet and then fought against the Gorkhas in Kali
Kumaon.
126
Earlier known as kurmanchal, kumaon fascinated Mahatma Gandhi. He wrote of it in Young India in
1929: "In these hills natural hospitality all men can do. The enchanting beauties of the Himalayas envelops
you. Leaves nothing to be desired. I wonder whether the scenary of the hills and the climate are to be
surpassed, if qualled by any beauty spot of the world."
127
112
at Makwanpur and advance on Kathmandu; the 2nd Division under
Major General Wood was to move into Nepal through Butwal and
cooperate with the 1st Division; the 3rd Division under Major General
Gillespie was to initially capture Dun and thence to operate against
Srinagar or Nahan; and finally, the 4th Division under Ochterlony was to
operate against the Gorkhas east of the Sutlaj and south of Bilaspur.
The indications of political agents working against the Gorkha citadels
of Kumaon were that they lacked strength both in numbers and will
power, could be subdued through determined advance and skirmish by
the Irregualrs. As Gillespie's 3rd Division was expected to turn the flank
of Kumaon by operating in Garhwal, the success could be further
facilitated. William Gardner and Hearsey, 128 129both energetic Eurasians
had shown great degree of enthusiasm in intelligence collection and
understanding the terrain of Kumaon. And both volunteered to raise
and lead a corps of Irregulars against the defence of Bam Shah in
Kumaon while Gillespie reduced the Gorkha defences in Dun and
elsewhere.
Moira saw a good opportunity to work on the plan which formulated
into a two-pronged advance to Almora. The column for Almora was
placed under Gardner, who by now had been given an acting rank of
Lieut Colonel and on the east Hearsey, being given an acting rank of
Lieut Colonel and on the east Hearsey, being made a Captain, was to
command the Irregulars through the Kali Kumaon. Hearsey was to
eventually converge at Almora. Both had full local support from Harsh
Dev Joshi- the so called Duke of Warwickshire of Kumaon-the man who
The reasons why the British regarded Garhwal and Kumaon essential to their security have already been
explained elsewhere. The passes of Thag La, Tsang Chak La, Mana, Niti, Tan Jung La, Kungribingri, Lipu
Lekh etc provided easy entry into Tibet or Tartary. The region served as a trade corridor to China.
128
Liet Colonel William Gardner. A King's officer. He had served Moira in Quiberon in 1795. Then acted as a
free lance mercenary in India and became Hearsey's brother-in-law.
129
113
earlier invited the Gorkhas but was now siding with the British in their
over-throw.130
The Gorkhas had been in occupation of Kumaon fro almost a quarter
century and their Governor Bam Shah had brought about considerable
stability –if not prosperity-in Kumaon. Though an able administrator, he
was distinctly a vacillating military commander. His own rapport with
Kathamandu was poor and he was under relentless pressure from the
British stratagems of dissension and subversion to support them in
surrendering the province of Kumaon or even as a bad case, defect to
them. But under him their were very able military commanders which
included his own brother Hasti Dal, then Governor of Doti province of
Nepal, Captain Angad, Chamu Bhandari, Subedar Zabar Adhikari,
Jasmardan Thapa, a Rohilla by name of Rengelu and his own son Nar
Shah.
Two main factors assisted Moira to take the calculated risk of launching
Irregulars into Almora. Firstly, the attitude to Bam Shah to British
overtures for reconciliation, negotiation and even territorial
adjustments including the other proclivity mentioned above. Secondly,
the paucity of Gorkha regular troops in Kumaon since most of them had
been diverted in from of reinforcements to Kalunga, Jaithak and the
Punjab Hill States. Although Bam Shah was relying on Hastidal to
defend the Kali Kumaon, and he had been assured by the Zamindars of
Rudrapur of support in the Terrai, his denuding of troops, nonetheless
became a temptation to Moira to let it be captured by Irregulars. In
addition, the local Kumaoni had been weaned away by Harsh Dev Joshi
who had unequivocally assured Gardner of more support and rebellion
in the country side131 Accordingly, Moira agreed to the large scale
employment of Rohillas, Pathans and the Kumanonis, Garhwali
Harsh Dev Joshi. Harsh Dev played his role continuously until this war, when he had joined Gardner in
January 1815 to advise him to fight the Gorkhas. Gardner, to quote Pemble, 'was struck by the intelligence of
Joshi and saw his utility'. The British made him a Tehsildar but he died in July 1815, lamenting and cursing
every one. However, his sons were given a petty pension by the British, as a sop.
130
131
See BD Pande,pp 373 (English Version).
114
volunteers. And as Rohillas had knowledge of the country (through
earlier invasions and trade), they were thought to be the better lots. The
Pathans were expected to join for temptations of large sum of
contractual money that the British were prepared to dole out. But they
were neither trained nor blooded in battle.
In January 1815, Gardner and Hearsey combine were then sprung into
action to concentrate their force in two separate areas i.e. Kashipur and
Pilibhit. The forces that finally joined up were:
Gardner : 3,000 Irregulars.
2.6 Pounders
Hearsey : 2,000 Pathans and 200 Kumaonis and two regular companies.
He also had some Gorkhas.132
Lieut Colonel Gardner made steady progress. He left Kashipur on 11
February, arrived at Dhikuli, up the course of the Kosi. Bam Shah's
early warning troops kept falling back. On 19 February, 1500 strong
detachment of Gardner occupied Kath-ki-Nau feature, while another
column was sent to Kotagarhi, Ukhaldhunga south of Bujan. It caused
Sardar Angad's forward troops on Bujan to fall back to Kumpur, south
of Chaubatia by 28 February.
Gardner kept up his movement along the Kosi, reaching Binakot, and
occupied the twin features of Chamuna Devi and Kapina-ka-Danda (also
known as Kathal-Lekh). In order to give a fight now, Sardar Angad,
occupied the feature of Point 5983. But Gardner fully supported and
accompanied by Joshi, found out from him that the 7,186 feet Syahi
Devi feature was unoccupied and its occupation would help unseat
132
The information on Hearsey's operations are also contained in micro-films in the Army Museum London.
115
Angad from forward positions. It worked. For, as Gardner placed a
strong detachment with difficulty on the snow covered peak of Syahi
Devi by 22 March and he himself occupied the large Katarmal feature
(Sun God Temple located here), the Gorkhas were left with no option
but to pull back to their main defences of Kalimath, Sitoli, Almora,
Gannath and Sintola.
It is interesting to note how Colonel Gardner, an Eurasian incharge of
Irregulars moved up along the kosi in the west and another Eurasian
Hyder Hearsey from the east. Both were to converge at Almora to bring
about a military defeat on Bam Shah. The sketch shows schematically
the progress of Gardner's advance to Katamal. It was a true see-saw,
stalking game. First the early warning troops of Bam Shah fell back
until they blocked Gardner's advance through the Ranikhet route first
by occupying Bujan and later Kumpur and Temple Hill (Point 5983).
Gardner switched his axis to Binakot and occupiued Chamua Devi and
later Syahi Devi. This made Angad Sardar to reel back to Sitoli and the
main complex. Gardner then firmed in at Katrmal doing his
reconnaissance and subversion before arrival on 12 April of Lieut
Colonel Nicolls with artillery and regular battalions.133
We leave Nicolls at Katarmal and move to the Kali Kumaon to see the
progress to Hearsey's column.
Hearsey's 2,000 Irregulars under Kalu Khan with two regular companies
marched up audaciously along the western bank of the famous River
Kali. Trudging along the jungle trail, they crossed the Timla Pass before
descending into the 'man-eater' country of Champawat.134 The Gorkhas
had deployed a thin screen of troops along the trail. Before Hearsey's
column could snake its way up to the Lohaghat-Pithoragarh track, the
Gorkha defences at Kautalgarh and Khilapati had to be overpowered.
Also see Pre- Muntiny Records Office of The Commissioner of Kumaon, PP 79; now located is regional
Archives, Lucknow.
133
134
Years later Champawat became famous for the story of Man Eater of Kumaon by Jim Corbett.
116
Hearsey occupied them and then based on the local intelligence, placed
detachments on the three crossing places on the Kali. He had been
tasked to demolish these bridge too.
The news of Hearsey's burly Pathans reached Hasti Dal, the Governor
of Doti and the younger brother of Bam Shah. He decided to confront
Hearsey. In a sharp attack on the morning of 2 April he overpowered the
Pathans and the Kumaonis at Khilapati and captured Hearsey, by then
wounded. An enraged Gorkha soldier was about to kill him when Hasti
Dal intervened. He was made prisoner and his Irregulars ran away. He
was then escorted to Almora. Before depatching him, Hasti dal told
Hearsey that, " hired men do not give their lives for a cause".
Was it to repay the gratitude that Hasti Dal owed him when he spared
the life of Hearsey, is difficult to say. But according to a "family story"
Hearsey had earlier saved Hasti Dal from being killed by a wild bear.
According to Hearsey's biography, in 1808 Moorcroft and Hearsey
having traveled to Tibet were returning through Garhwal when they
were intercepted by the Gorkhas at Srinagar and were accused of
espionage. It was Hasti Dal who helped him to be released from the
Gorkhas. It was thus a strange acquaintance-cum-friendship of Hasit
Dal with Hearsey that was being enacted at Khilapati.
Hasti Dal retook the fort of Kutalgarh by defeating Hearsey's Adjutant
Mr Martindale, another free lance British seeking adventure. Martindale,
however managed to escape with his Pathans and Kumaonis, who time
and again, proved no match to the Gorkhas. The casualties suffered
were 31 killed and 53 wounded.
A third and subsidiary force was also arranged to move in the centre of
these two main forces. Its strength was 500 and its objective was to link
up with Gardner's force. It reached Bhim Tal and then the Gorkhas
never allowed it to move or link up.
117
What was admirable with the British logistics was the mail that moved
to and from the field formations to Moira's roving headquarters. He had
just been to Moradabad and thence Saharanpur. It is a Moradabad that
he received the letters from Gardner and others which gave out the
situation. Post-haste he appreciated the landslide that he would have to
cross. If Kumaon was to be got, Gorkhas were to be chastised and if he
were to keep his job as Governor General and C-in_C, he had to move
fast. He saw Gardner going slow and being uncertain of tackling Bam
Shah (If he offered full resistance). Gardner having known the prowess
of the Gorkhas already from the accounts of the British failures and his
own judgements, chose to avoid confrontation as far as possible and
naturally went slow. He took a whole month on at Kapina-ka-Danda. He
was not 'appreciated' by the Governor General fro the delay. IN fact,
Moira was in a panic as well as anger and he decided to pick on Colonel
Jasper Nicolls (14th Foot), Quarter Maste of the King's forces and one
easily available to take on the task.135
Gardner's role need not be played down as Hearsey's, who divided his
force and helped it get destroyed piecemeal. For, Gardner had moved
his force with skill and caution better than Generals Wood and Marley in
the east. And having got it into its firm base, deployed tactically so well
that it could retain operational flexibility. He had a good firm base
available and his intelligence was superb. The Syahi Devi feature
however looked too far for deploying either a gun or influencing the
battle of Almora effectively. It nonetheless offered him no specific
tactical advantage in later stages of battle; on the contrary it became a
problem of logistic. It must be understood that the plan that Nicolls
followed- and took the credit for success had been evolved by
Gardner.136
135
136
118
On arrival of Nicolls the force level was increased substantially.
Besides the Irregulars there built up ¼ NI (761), 2/5 NI (764), 15th NI
(500), 27th NI (1,500) and 2, 12 pounders, 6, 6 pounders and 2, 4 2/5 inch
mortars under Lieuts CH Bell and RB Wilson. The entire strength rose
up more than 7,000.
The plan Nicolls inherited from Gardner was to go in for Sitoli and
Kalimath together before expanding to Almora; or go to Gannath and
then roll down on Almora. The Gorkhas were now disposed off
generally on Kalimath (150), Sitoli (200) under Sirdar Angad, Almora (
250 distributed in pockets at Lal Mandi, Nanda Devi, Deep Chand
Temple area and Haridungri- the site of present day cemetery), and
Gannath (200) with a small reinforcement having moved from Doti
under Hasti Dal on 6 April when he brought Hearsey to Nanda Devi fort.
There were no guns with the Gorkhas and their overall condition is best
narrated in the words of Bam Shah: "We holding Sitoli and Almora,
inspite of some reinforcements brought by Hasti Dal, we are very much
fewer in numbers. We are hard up for supplies, and having received no
pay, men are tempting to go out and alienate the people." Bam Shah
himself had decided to sell some of his jewellery to raise money to buy
supplies and keep the Gorkhas from open rebellion and desertion. The
overall morale of the Gorkhas was low.
Nicolls was hoping that Bam Shah would come around, and handover
Almora and Kumaon to him without a fight . A fortnight was now spent
in negotiations, which led to nothing, till on the 22nd April, according to
the British version, "crisis was produced by hasti Dal taking a strong
detachment, and marching northward from Almora."
What were these negotiations about ? There are on records,
instructions to Edward Gardner (brother of Leiut Colonel Gardner) the
political agent, to open negotiations with Bam Shah from early 1814.
Copies of Correspondence between Bam Shah and Sir E Colebrooke
are also available in these records. All show an orchestrated and
119
motivated plan to 'buy' Bam Shah. In the end Colonel Bradshaw
informed Gardner that "although Bam Shah had broken negotiations,
the British government will not disclose to the Nepal government his
past acts". A clear case of Bam Shah's complicity, or indiscretion-or
both as he was compelled to hob-nob with British agents; and also of
the British attempts to blackmail him. Much of it has been explained by
Gardner in his letter of 22 November 1814 placed at PNRW, PP 298299.137
Even BD Pande called Bam Shah not only a disaffected man (which
indeed, he was) but one who made " peace cheap" fro the British.138 The
British temptation of offering to him the post of Governor of Doti after
the ceasefire remained in the mind. The Durbar had also not had good
relations with Bam Shah. Bhim Sen suspected him to not toeing his line
and Bam Shah himself thought, Bhim Sen had little idea of diplomacy
lesser still of statecraft as expected of a statesman Prime Minister of
Nepal. What, therefore, lacked in Kathmandu, Bam Shah tried to do
from Almora during the last few months of his Governorship when the
war clouds hovered in 1814-1815. The British, expert in exploitative
machinations, endeavored to engineer their strategies so as to make
Bam Shah look suspicious in the eyes of his own people.
In response to Gardner's letters, Bam Shah finally wrote to him by
dissociating himself from any future incrimination: " What you observe
regarding the state of the roads and difficulties of intercourse.. You
have alluded to my correspondence with Mr Rutherford.. My
communications with that Gentle man were merely lamenting that the
strict and ancient friendship between the two states should have been
disturbed by trifling altercations between Zamindars on frontiers of
Palpa and Butwal. It is probably on this subject that you required me to
send you a confidential person on my part… I will depatch a trustworthy
person." Inspite of the non-ambiguous nature of Bam Shah's letter, the
137
138
120
British continued to play on the point that somewhere, somehow he
would prove slippery.
The controversy is put to its end by Campbell's notes: At a later period
we offered Bam Shah and his brother (Hasti Dal), our protection and
guarantees, in the event of their declaring themselves independent
rulers of the Province of Doti. But like Amar Singh under similar
circumstances, they scorned the idea of deserting in time of need of
their lawful sovereign and native cournty.139
Both from the diplomatic angle and the military side the Gorkhas had to
fight at Almora under great constraints. The Kumaonis had begun to
desert by hundreds and the civilians were refusing to help them with
provision s and intelligence. Instead, they were siding openly with the
British and no movement of the Gorkhas was hidden. Their moves were
reported as promptly to Nicolls for money and they themselves
volunteered to guide the British columns.
As the battle indications built up by 20th April, Gorkhas began to read
just their positions. It was rightly appreciated that by capture of the
Gannath heights the British would not only be able to attack Almora
easily from that direction but the Gorkha line of communications to
Garhwal would be automatically severed. Though Bam Shah had a
small detachment on Gannath he planned to send his brother with a
larger possible detachment of men to take over the defensive
responsibility. Hasti Dal, in the meanwhile instructed the detachment on
Gannath to also expand its defences near the temple (today's
government nursery) from where the gradient commences to the
Gannath Temple. The stockade, in his opinion would have the
advantage of water from the temple and it could be really well defended.
The work on it had carried on for some time.
139
121
Then a new move by Nicolls of a large force of more than 900 men to
occupy a firm base near the stockade was learnt. (It had seven
companies of 5 NI, % flank companies, 100 Irregular mostly the
deserters from the Gorkha and 2, 6 pounders). This obviously was seen
as danger to the small detachment of the Gorkhas in the area. Hasti
Dal's move to this place was carried out when Bam Shah was told that "
2,500 men are in a stockade on the Fatehpur Hill (the general area of the
Temple) and our communications with Bageshwar are threatened."140
Hasti Dal joined them on 22nd April with depleted companies of Taradal
and Bhawanibaksh and was soon organizing the defence. The biggest
treachery against the Gorkhas was done by the priest of local temple of
Gannath who briefed Major Patton, the force commander that "the time
of evening meal was most favourable for attack". The Gorkhas were
taken by surprise and the contest was soon decided. After a short
sharp fight, the Gorkhas suffered a loss of an officer and 32 men killed
on the spot, while many were wounded including their leader Hasti Dal,
who succumbed to his injuries before reaching Almora. The British
suffered two killed and 26 wounded. Loss of Gannath dashed Bam
Shah's hope to fight a protracted war.
There are versions which are at variance with the present one141
Adequate proof exists that patton's force had been guided quietly by
the priest and evening when the Gorkhas were in the process of eating
their meals and had been fully surprised. In Hasti Dal, who was
regarded as " a jewel of the Gorkha Commander", the loss for Bam
Shah was both personal and military. For, Hasti Dal was the most
valuable, active and enterprising officer and a man whose character
was particularly amiable. His position now became like Amar Sigh's
after the loss of Bhakti Thapa. After the Gannath action, Bam Shah had
been left with just about 200 men and almora became an easy walkover
for the British.
140
141
122
Bam Shah may have been a vacillating commander and even a suspect
on account of hob-nobbing with the British, but he was a Gorkha who
did not surrender tamely. He decided to fight it out in his own way.
Hearing of the success of Patton's action at Gannath, Nicolls
immediately proceeded to attack Almora. The battle, a sharp and swift
action of five hours on night 26/27 April saw the end of the Gorkhas in
Kumaon. By this time, Nicolls had also been informed that Ochterlony
had made a deep wedge in Amar Singh's defences at Malaun (Rajgarh).
In his effort to subtly and covertly influence negotiations and military
action, he had been telling Bam Shah that the Gorkhas had already lost
the war. The British propaganda proved successful and convincing
communication black-out, resulted. This was further aggravated by
interception of dak all over.
Nicolls advanced on Sitoli via Hawalbagh then a treeless spur (unlike
now a good jungle). 4 NI and Gardner's horde moved up and captured
the two stockadge that made the defences of Sitoli Ridge. Sitoli opend
the routes to Almora town-five of them as Nicolls papers make them
out. These were perhaps to cemetery, Hiradungi, Kalimath and three
small tracks to the down, its tow forts and the Palace/Temple. Now the
geography of Almora is different. But the battle and names as they
appear on sketch below would serve the purpose. The Nicoll papers
that are housed in the India Office Library (UK) help explain the battle to
some extent. Bam Shah's letter also shows details, though this letter
had, obviously been written under duress as every thing had been lost
by then and some of the statements in it are in self-defence as also
British-tutored. It nonetheless helps to understand the battle from the
Gorkha side of the story.
Briefly Sitoli was commanded by Angad. He could not defened it,
inspite of extra ammunition having been sent with Bam Shah's son, Nar
Shah. Kalimath defences were commanded by Bhandari Kazi and it had
counter-attacked the advancing British echelons at Hiradungi
123
(Cemetery). It caused some damage to the British as Lieut Tepley of
2/27 NI was killed and several were wounded.
The battle of the fort was fought on night of 25th April. It was pounded
with mortars from 6 pm in the evening until next morning. The Gorkha
detachment at Kalimath counter-attacked inflicting some casualties on
the Indian Infantry. The battle was terminated at 9 a.m. when taking
council from Captain Hearsey, Bam Shah sued for peace. A strange
case of an evemy's counsel being heeded.
The casualties suffered by the Nicoll's force exceeded 200 in this easy,
five hour battle against an opposition that was so feeble. The casualties
actually took place due to the mix-up, and confusion of the night attack
and self inflicted casualties by the British. It was said that the Gorkhas
dressed as Rohillas attacked them. A Mongol could never look like an
Indian Pathan or Muslim even in dream or darkness. But a reson had to
be found, however cloudy.
The rest of the drama of negotiations is best narrated in the words of
Atkinson:
The aritillery fire was continued until 9 a.m., when the Chauntra sent a
letter under a flag of truce, supported by a letter from Captain Hearsey,
requesting a suspension of hostilities and offering to treat the
evacuation of the province on the basis of the terms offered to the
Chauntra several weeks previously by Mr Gardner …. The Convention
for the evacuation and surrender of Kumaon was signed on 27th April,
1815 by E Gardner, Bam Shah, Chamu Bhandari and Jasmardan
Thapa… On the 29th April Bam Shah and his Sardars paid a
complimentary visit to Mr Gardner and Colonel Nicolls and were
received with a salute of Nineteen guns…. The same evening
Jasmardan Thapa on the part of Bam Shah came with an open letter
that it might be forwarded to Amar Singh Thapa. Ranjor Singh and the
124
other Sardars at Jaithak and Nahan advising them to endeavor to obtain
for themselves similar condition and to withdraw their forces from the
western hills to the east the Kali" (Emphasis by author).142
Bam Shah must share the aweful responsibility of destroying the
Gorkha empire.143 in Kumaon.
On the British side there was miscarriage of justice when it came to
give credit to Wolliam Gardner. The Governor General's last word on
Kumaon heaped all praise on Nicolls ignoring Gardner totally. He called
Nicolls " a man of judgement of unremitting activity; of gallant
promptitude, against obstinate resistance of a courageous enemy ..".
The British achieved their objective of obtaining a trade corridor
through Kumaon, which ipso-facto was their strategic aim of the
campaign. But that it would bring about a wind-fall was hardly
expected. For, the cheapest victor at Almora provided them with the
largest gain. It is a truism to say that while Almora became a burden of
history fro the Gorkha, it paved the way to Malaun and th Treaty of
Sagauli, for the British.
The Hiradungi Cemetry
The tombstones at the cemetery of Kirk and Tapley besides the
remnants of the forts at Pithoragrah and Almoara, the terrain features
alone are the war memorials and archives of this battle.
1.
142
143
The tombstone of Lieutenants
125
Kirk and Tepley
Both of the 2nd Battalion 27th Regiment Native Infantry
Native Infantry
The latter was killed on the evening of the April 1815 on duty as an
Advanced Post in the town of Almora. The former died on the 16th May
following a victim to zealous and continued extension in this final
operations of the campaign.
2.
The writings on the Fort Nanda Devi or Malla Mahal Almora. The
Fort was erected by the Chand Rajas of Kumaon and
strengthened by the Gorkhas and was captured by the British
under Colnel Nicholls on the 26th April 1815. The convention for
the surrender and evacuation of Kumaon was signed the
following day (i.e. 27th April 1815).
STAGNATION IN SIRMUR
ARTINDELL's was a very different character from Gillespie's. he was
courteous, gentle, unaffected, and so withdrawn in his social habits that he
Mseldom visited or entertained. In his younger days he had shown vigour and
perseverance, if not much imagination, and the battalion of native infantry
which he had raised and commanded as a major had been generally
recognized as one of the best in the service. Appointed to command in
turbulent Bundelkhand in 1804, he had done useful work of pacification and
earned the 'approbation and applause' of the Governor-General.
But by 1815 the effects of forty years in the Indian climate, of which the
last four of five had been soured by failure and the loss of the confidence of
his superiors, had begun to show. His ardour had become dampened; his
self-assurance sapped. His siege of Kalanjar of 1812, although counted a
success, had nevertheless involved the repulse of the storming party with
severe loss; and it seems that from this time the ageing officer had begun to
lose all taste for responsibility and to become a prey to vacillation and
126
excessive caution. In 1813 he had been ordered to advance with a force of
over 6,000 men into Rewa, a principality in east Bundelkhand whose Raja
was refusing to honour the terms of his alliance with the Calcutta
government. The Political Agent in Bundelkhand having sent an ultimatum to
the Raja, Martindell had been instructed not to delay his march and his
operations against the fortress for anything less than the arrival of the Raja or
his deputies in his camp, for the season was advanced and the rains
imminent. Martindell had reached Panna, his rendezvous, on 8 April; but
instead of advancing forthwith, as ordered, had dithered there in a state of
nervous consternation because his spies had bought reports, which were
obviously false, that the Pindaris were intending to create a diversion by
invading the Company's territory in another quarter. He had then been sent
the 'most urgent and positive orders of the Commander-in-Chief to proceed .
. . . without any reference to external circumstances which were . . .. .
beyond the sphere of his cognizance'. Yet still he had dallied, now waiting for
an artillery train from Ajaigarh-'although he was in possession of
Commander-in-Chief's unqualified opinion that his march ought not to be
delayed on that account'. On 23 April he had moved at last, 'having . . . .
remained inactive at Panna during the period of a fortnight at the most critical
season of the year, and when the delay of a single day might have hazarded
the success of the expedition'. To crown this display of ineptitude, Martindell
had waited in advance of the fortress of Rewa for the arrival of the Raja or his
agents and the junction of reinforcements from Mirzapur, ignoring strict
instructions to chastise some of the Raja's particularly contumacious
zemindars; and had then negotiated and concluded, entirely without
authority, a treaty with the Raja. This had caused considerable
embarrassment. The whole business of negotiation had had to be reopened
and the military operations against the zemindars held over until the following
season. Official approval and thanks had been publicly withheld from
Martindell on this occasion, and he had been permitted to relinquish
command of the Rewa force.
In March 1814, at the age of fifty-five, he had resigned his command in
Bundelkhand and withdrawn to Cawnpore.
Hastings's reasons for withdrawing Martindell from his semiretirement
to command the army in Sirmur were hardly flattering.
127
The selection of Major-General Martindell for the command [he told the
Secret Committee of the Court of Directors], was founded on the general
character which he had acquired in a long course of service; the hope that
the occurrences attending his command at Rewa in the year would have
stimulated him to exert himself in regaining the ground he had lost in the
public estimation on that occasion; and, more than all, the difficulty of finding
any other unemployed officer of rank sufficient to exercise so large a
command.144
But there was little reason to hope that Martindell would prove able to
seize this opportunity to repair his dilapidated reputation. His disgrace had
made himself doubting and subservient, and his command in Sirmur could
only have succeeded had he been surrounded by purposeful subordinates.
Instead of that, the officers of H.M. and on whose advice he was therefore
most inclined to rely, were discouraged and diffident. As a result of their
double failure in Kalanga and the Governor-General's vendetta, they shrank
from all projects which seemed to involve the slightest risk of another repulse.
Company officers like John Ludlow, on the other hand, quickly grew impatient
of policies which they considered to be supine and timid. They fretted for a
more dynamic leadership. Subjection to two contradictory influences made
Martindell hopelessly uncertiain and bewildered, and he found it more and
more difficult to make decision..
Having commanded in Bundelkhand for a considerable time, the MajorGeneral was an accustomed as any officer in India to mountain warfare; but
the scene of his present operations surpassed in difficulty anything even in
his experience. Nahan nestles compactly on a plateau, which rises some
3,000 feet above the level of the lowlands, and which is shielded to the north
by a massive ridge of hills. The Markanda hugs its north-western skirts,
taking a route down through the hills and across the mottled plains that is
visible for miles when winter rains have purged the air. There are occasional
groves of pine, shisham and wild fruit trees on the surrounding slopes, but
the vegetation is mostly scrub and flowering thorn, spread sparsely, so that
the light ochres and lunar textures of the ground show through. The eastern
part of Nahan, round the citadel, is walled, and then seemed immensely
strong. The camp site of the British army was six or seven miles to the south,
and separated from the town by the valley of a tributary of the Markanda. The
144
P.R.N.W., p. 737.
128
road ascending from this nulla to the town was about five miles long. It was a
mere track scratched on to the surface of the rock, all sharp angles and
hairpin bends, and so narrow and steep that it seemed impassable for any
animal. It was, furthermore, defended at almost every turn by a stone redoubt
in the shape of a star. Hastings, appreciating that the army must be dispirited
after the repulses at Kalanga, had advised Martindell to blockade the place,
rather than risk an assault; but such a recommendation, in view of the
inaccessibility of Nahan, seemed superfluous. A storm must have been
suicide.
Martindell made up his mind to move the camp to a spur farther to the
north-east, which was only about four miles from Nahan ridge, and ordered
Ludlow to occupy the position with a small force. Soon after Ludlow had left,
intelligence was received that Ranajor Singh Thapa had abandoned the town
and retired to the fort of Jaithak in its rear. This seemed too good to be true,
but Ludlow was instructed to probe his way forward to test the truth of the
report. The journey was an exhausting half-day's work, and some of the
camels fell and were dashed to pieces; but not a shot was fired in resistance
as the troops walked into the neat and narrow streets of Nahan. By one
o'clock, the British flag was flying over the citadel.
Henry Sherwood marveled that the enemy had ever allowed the
advance to reach the town, which seemed as though it might have been
defended for ever. 'The Gurkhas at one moment defend themselves well, not
only with bravery but with judgement; and at another, neglect the commonest
means of defense', he wrote. But then he had not yet seen Jaithak.
Artillery might conceivably have been brought to bear on Nahan; but to
bring it to bear Jaithak, whither Ranjor Singh had now retired on the advice of
his father, Amar Singh Thapa, was apparently a physical impossibility. This
stone fort was rectangular, with bastions at each corner, and tiny. It
measured only about twelve yards by eight. Clinging like a swallow's nest to
a pinnacle, it seemed invulnerable. To bombard it, guns would first have to be
brought up to Nahan- which seemed hardly practicable, for a start-then
somehow directed at a target which was not only three miles distant as the
crow flies, but some 1,600 feet higher again.
It stands altogether detached [wrote Henry Sherwood, in despair], and is of
so great a declivity that we have no idea how we are top roceed . . . It is
doubtful whether, with all our exertions, we shall ever be able to make a road
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for the guns and mortars even to Nahan . . . Even if this is done, can they
proceed farther? And even if they do, can they find a spot to throw shells
from (for a mortar cannot throw at above 45 degrees elevation)? . . . As for
the great guns, they appear out of the question.
He thought that the only hope lay in a scheme of protracted investment,
because the fort was reputedly short of water. 'However,' he added, 'take it
ever so easy, even without the loss of a man, I think it one of the most illjudged, ill-conducted enterprises ever heard of.' His feelings seem to have
been shared by most of the other officers of the 53rd.
If he had decided to act in the spirit of their assessment and tried to
starve Jaithak into surrender, Martindell would have been acting in full
harmony with Hastings's instructions. But he reckoned that his force was too
small, his maps too inaccurate, and the approaches to the fort obviously too
many and too dispersed, for a blockade to be effective. He became sure, in
fact, that the position of Jaithak made it better suited to bombardment. It
perched at the angle of two rising mountainous ridges, which converge to
form an arrow-head pointing towards Nahan. It obviously could not be
bombarded from Nahan; but it could conceivably be bombarded from one or
both of these ridges. True, the guns would have to be brought to the ridges;
but after his experiences at Kalanjar, Martindell was no novice in the art of
moving heavy ordnance to seemingly impossible places, and dogged
perseverance was one of his old qualities which he still retained. He therefore
resolved to brave the misgivings of Mawby and the officers of the 53rd and
opt for bombardment. Hastings was quite happy to defer to this decision. It
was first necessary to bring the guns to Nahan, so the pioneers and fatigue
parties were set working to widen the road which led up from the artillery
park, at the foot of Nahan hill. Knowing this would be a protracted operation,
Martindell decided to establish a position on each of the ridges in the
meantime.
During the night of 26 December, two columns were formed for this
purpose, the intention being to seize the two ridges simultaneously, each
force causing a diversion in favour of the other. Ludlow, with about 800 men,
was to take the left, and Major William Richards,145 with about 500, the right
ridge. Acting in concert, these forces would, it was reckoned, outnumber the
145
Later General Sir William Richards.
130
Nepalese, who were estimated to be about 1,000 strong. Each column had a
couple of six-pounders and two small howitzers, carried on elephants; and it
was reckoned that both should reach their positions before daylight.
Richards, having farther to go, set off at about a quarter to eleven that night.
Ludlow moved at one o'clock the next morning, and engaged the enemy first.
The enemy's main water supplies were derived from wells on these
ridges, so they were heavily guarded. They lent themselves well to defense
because they were both dominated by the pinnacle of Jaithak. There crests
were, furthermore, jagged, and almost every peak along them was crowned
with a picket or a stockade.
Ludlow's destination was a peak about a mile from the fort on the left
ridge. The distance from Nahan was some six miles, 'but equal to twenty
from the ruggedness of the road'. Dawn was already breaking when he
began to climb up the side of the ridge; and the column, hampered by the
ponderous elephants, had become widely scattered. When about two miles
from the point at which they were aiming, the front half of the column, which
comprised the grenadiers of the 53rd and some companies of native light
infantry, passed under the enemy's first position on the crest, which was a
stockade. They had now lost the cover of darkness and were within range.
The Nepalese in the stockade shot at them, but Ludlow commanded his
advance guard to reserve its fire-unless warmly engaged-until it reached the
crest. The force passed under two more posts,146 each of which opened fire,
but the men, well covered by the uneven ground, pressed on obediently and
did not stop to retaliate.
By eight o'clock, the advance was within 200 yards of the summit. The
fourth and principal enemy post was just ahead-strong, and generously
garrisoned. Ludlow was still under good cover, and he called a halt to enable
the column to consolidate. While he was still waiting for his own battalion, the
1st/6th Native Infantry, which was toiling a long way behind, a guide brought
word that considerable enemy reinforcements were on their way down from
the fort. Ludlow now had about 400 men at hand and, after a rapid
assessment of the alternatives open to him, he decided to try to take the
unreinforced post with the men he had, instead of waiting to attack it with his
Circular depressions in the ground still mark the sites of these stockades, but the ridge is now
considerably more wooded than it was then.
146
131
whole force, which would give the enemy reinforcement time to come up. He
gave the order, and the European grenadiers and native infantry charged
with fixed bayonets up the remaining section of the ascent, scattering the
enemy form the post. John Ludlow was an energetic and impulsive officer. In
taking this position on the crest, he had done what he had been ordered to
do; but his men were eager and the Nepalese in disarray, and in such a
situation it would have taken more than the letter of his instructions to restrain
him. He urged his men to give chase, so that once they had reached the
crest they did not stop, but turned sharply right to push their adversaries back
up the ridge. The next peak in the direction of the fort was topped by the
ruined village of Jampta, where the enemy had their third post. The
grenadiers of the 53rd reached it first, and the Nepalese, still unformed and
unsteady, fell back to their second position to make their stand. Down went
the grenadiers again, and up to the second post, a picket. Here the struggle
was savage; but the Nepalese, still winded and dazed, were finally forced to
retreat yet again, to their first post, which was the stockade. Behind that lay
the cantonments of the fort itself. It was now about half-past eight. Forces
gleaming with sweat, buoyant with triumph, tendons taut and trembling, the
grenadiers and their officers turned eagerly to Ludlow for the word to charge
the stockade. This time, the commander hesitated. His better judgement
warned him that it was strong and already reinforced; that his won force was
small; and, his rear being so far behind, that he was without support. But he
was too grateful for the valour of his men, and too excited by their success, to
be resolute and stern, as they surrounded him, clamouring, beseeching and
reproaching. 'Why, sir, there ain't more than eight or ten men in the stockade,
and bye and bye there'll be as many hundred!' Instead of positively ordering
his men to halt, as he later admitted he should have, Ludlow could only
implore them to spare themselves. 'You have already done more than I
expected. Why not take breath awhile, and wait for the others and the guns?
Let them come up, and then we'll see what can be done.'
Even as he was speaking, two or three of the grenadiers roared out
huzza! and part of the light infantry leapt forward. Ludlow could still have
stopped them, but he succumbed to the fever which forces winning gamblers
to go on when it is obvious that they should stop. He consented to the
charge, trying to convince his better self that, since even a positive command
could not then have restrained the men, this was the only way of sparing
them the stigma of disobedience.
132
It was a lapse that he lived to regret bitterly. The men rushed ahead.
The Nepalese, strengthened by reinforcements from the fort and steadied by
a few minutes' respite, allowed them to come close. Then they sallied out on
either side of the stockade and charged them, with Khukuris drawn, from both
sides and from the front simultaneously. Ludlow's party reeled away-not
down the crest of the ridge the way they had come, but sideways, over the
flank of the ridge. The Nepalese followed noisily, forcing them to stumble, slip
and slide down the precipitous mountainside. Ludlow managed to rally them
for a few minutes farther down; but ammunition was low and it was
impossible to keep up a consistent fire. The enemy increasing in numbers all
the time, poured over the crest like spilt liquid, and Ludlow had no option but
to retreat again.
In this, his moment of greatest need, he was forsaken by his own
corps, which formed the rearguard of his column. When the vanguard was
repulsed, the sepoys of the 1st/6th Native Infantry had come as far as Jampta;
but then, instead of moving forward to support the grenadiers and light
companies, which, because their communications were entire, they were well
able to do, they became so terrified by the sight of events in front that they
refused to form and began to back away. Officers shouted and swore,
struggling to make themselves heard above a rising babble of fear; but all
their efforts to impose order were made vain by the crucial defect in the
military system which this crisis exposed. Casualties at Kalanga had so
depleted the battalion's small complement of European officers that only
three were on duty, and this was simply not enough to allay the panic of 400
men. The military machine could not accommodate Ludlow's human error of
allowing the column to become too extended. The men of the 1st/6th, instead
of advancing to succor comrades who were fighting for their lives, took to
their heels and fled.
Ludlow, on the side of the ridge, worked desperately to hold a position.
Twice more he rallied the men; but twice he had yield his ground. On the last
occasion, his musketry spluttered into silence. There were no more cartridges
and, as he still received no support from the 1st/6th, he had no choice but to
order an uncovered retreat. It became a rout. Breaking formation entirely, the
men partly ran, partly fell and partly jumped down the rocky slopes, crashing
through the tussocks and wildly clutching at branches to control their descent.
So precipitate was their flight, that the remains of the detachment were back
in camp by ten o'clock. The casualties amounted to 151, of whom about a
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dozen, including one officer, Lieutenant Munt, were killed. Ludlow himself
reached Nahan unhurt, save for a sprained ankle, but he burned with shame.
'I should have thought it a friendly ball that had brought me to the ground', he
wrote to his wife. He blamed his won unmastered greed for triumph for the
repulse at the final stockade; but for the fiasco into which it had needlessly
developed he blamed the lack of European officers and the reluctance of his
own 'raggamuffin set of a crops' to meet khukuri with bayonet.
Hastings was disturbed by such gave misconduct on the part of native
troops, especially since he had been in the habit of indirectly reprehending
the King's men by paying the sepoys marked compliments and praises.
Nevertheless, his inclination was still to treat this behaviours as altogether
exceptional-'a circumstance almost unheard of in the Bengal army'-and he
forbore, in view of 'the peculiar circumstances of the public service . . . and of
[Martindell's] detachment in particular', to inflict condign punishment. All he
ordered was that the European officers who had been commanding the crops
should report any instances of cowardice on the part of native officers which
they had noticed, and that all so accused should be immediately dismissed.
He feared the effects of stronger punishment on native troops already
subjected to the unusual stresses of mountain war-and not without reason.
Even his mild censure and the few courts martial which followed it seriously
undermined the morale of the 1st/6th, and in subsequent weeks the corps lost
over 100 men by desertion. Hastings, as Commander-in-Chief, could not
avoid officially expressing his regret that the column had not moved more
slowly and that Ludlow had not been able to restrain the men in advance; but
George Fagan, the Adjutant-General, privately assured Ludlow that his
personal reputation had not suffered.
I read extracts and parts of your letter where descriptive of the scene and of
your own feelings to Lord [Hastings], who has been pleased to allow me to
tell your privately 'that it has not in the slightest degree impaired his good
opinion of you; and that the misbehavior of troops, whether proceeding in one
case from blind and precipitate rashness, or in the other from backwardness,
often ruins the best conceived hopes of success and renders every effort of
their leader vain'. Do not then suffer yourself to be depressed, my dear friend;
you have already established sufficient claims to public favour and
approbation and to the confidence of your superiors, and you will continue to
increase them.
134
Poor 53rd! Nothing they could do was right. At Kalanga it had been their
shirking and now it was their 'blind and precipitate rashness' that was
responsible for failure. Officers of the 53rd deeply resented this last
judgement, and it long remained an issue of controversy in Indian military
circles. Critics of the native army attributed it to a blind prejudice in favour of
the sepoys and their officers among servants of the East India Company.147
This was not its real cause, however. Ludlow was partly responsible,
because he admitted his own error with the sort of manly frankness which
was especially calculated to put Hastings into a forgiving mood, and at the
same time implied that he had risked his own reputation in order to spare that
of the men; but there is no doubt that, more than anything else, it was the
deep grudge he had borne the 53rd ever since the incidents at Kalanga that
influenced Hasting's attitude.
While Ludlow dealt with the left, William Richards marched north-east
towards the right-hand ridge. When he left Nahan, at a quarter to eleven on
the night of 26 December, there was not enough ammunition in camp for his
column to be supplied with spare cartridges, so the men left with only those
they had in pouch. A sergeant's party was left to bring on the extra rounds
when they had arrived from the park. This party followed with the spare
cartridges in the early hours of the morning, but by some negligence was not
provided with a guide. In the darkness it lost its way, and the sergeant had to
leave the ammunition with the coolies in a convenient village while he went
back to Nahan for help. He turned to the village just before dawn, only to find
the Nepali prowlers had bagged the ammunition. 60,000 cartridges had been
lost.
Richards's march was sixteen miles. The stony pathway plunged and
mounted, and was never more than wide enough for single files. He was
always having to call a halt, to enable the rear and the ordnance elephants to
come up. The last two and a half miles were unremitting steep ascent, and it
was until eight o'clock in the morning of the 27th that the advance guard
reached the crest of the ridge. Fortunately, the point where it ascended, a
peak about two and half miles form the fort, was not defended. As there was
water close by, Richards halted for two hours, to allow the stragglers to come
up and to take some rest. Then he advanced along a narrow footpath on the
northern side of the ridge, taking possession of successive peaks, and finally
147
See Asiatic Journal, vol. xi : London, May 1821, p. 432.
135
reached a pinnacle which was only about 1,000 yards from Jaithak. He was
greeted by musket and gun fire from the fort; but this dead little damage, and
by noon he was firmly established in this position, which was called Peacock
Hill.
Near one o'clock, the Gurkha drums beat to arms, and a considerable
force assembled and paraded under the walls of the fort. Richards could tell
from their number, which was about 1,500 and from the silence in the
direction where Ludlow was supposed to have ascended, that something had
happened to upset the plan for concerted action. He thought that Ludlow
must have been recalled for some reason-which meant that his won 500 men
had the undivided enemy force to deal with. Soon after, the Nepalese moved
down from the fort and began an attack with guns and musketry. Their fire
was directed against Richards's advanced post, which was on the slope
before the summit he occupied; but its position was no well protected that
casualties wee trifling.
Towards four o'clock, however, when the spare ammunition still had not
arrived and when there was still no sign of activity on Ludlow's ridge,
Richards' anxiety began to mount. He wrote note for Martindell describing his
situation, and had two sepoys disguise themselves and take it to Nahan.
Meanwhile, finding that the British fire was slackening, the Nepalese became
bolder and make several attempts to storm points in his position. Deciding he
must concentrate his resources, Richards called up a party which he had
posted to guard the well in a hollow some 300 yards below his left, and to
husband the remaining ammunition, gave strict orders that all fire be reserved
until the last possible minute. It was a notorious weakness of the sepoys that
they could seldom be made to do this. They would always squander their
cartridges by firing before they could have accurate aim. But on this occasion
the instruction was scrupulously obeyed, and the men eked out their precious
cartridges with stones.
Soon the light began to fail, and the enemy edged nearer. Again and
again bands of them tore up to the breastwork which the pioneers had built in
front of the advanced post and tried to force their way in; but each time they
were repulsed. The European officers spared no effort to inspirit the men.
Even the surgeon, Darby, took a musket, slung a cartridge box over his
shoulder and made good use of both whenever he could snatch a few
minutes from medical duties. Lieutenant Thomas Thackeray, commanding
136
the light company of the 2/26th Native Infantry, still could not use his right
arm, which had been wounded at Kalanga; but he made Richards promise
that he might deal with the enemy if they charged again. He was an uncle of
the future novelist, William Makepeace, who was at that time a small pale boy
of four living in Calcutta. Soldiering was a vocation which claimed the
passionate and exclusive devotion of this twenty-five-year-old subaltern, and
his ambition to realize its best ideals in his own conduct burned with brilliant
and destructive intensity. He had already crammed a decade of campaigning
into his short life, crossing swords with the Marathas and the rebellious rajas
of Bundelkhand. His men revered him as a paragon, and all immediately
volunteered to repel the next attack. When the Nepalese assaulted again, for
the eighth or ninth time, Thackeray and his company careered lustily at them
and swept them back down the hill.
By half-past seven it was quite dark, and the enemy muskets spurted
luminous tongues. Ammunition was almost spent, but Richards remained
confident. His situation was strong and his losses no more than about twenty
killed and wounded, and he reasoned that by now a reinforcement must
surely be at hand. Then, almost simultaneously, he received two messages
from Martindell. They were both to the same effect, and he could hardly
believe that he had read them right. The General had sent no ammunition
and no reinforcement; only curt and peremptory orders that he was to return
to camp at once.
At half-past nine that morning, when he received news of Ludlow's
defeat, Martindell immediately wrote to Richards, ordering him to return to
camp. Now that it would not have the benefit of a diversion of the left ridge,
he feared that, if it was allowed to continue, the column would be destroyed.
By another oversight, the guide and intelligence staff had failed to make
arrangements for messengers to be posted along the route of the column, so
these instructions never arrived. This was soon apparent to all officers in
camp, because Peacock Hill was fully visible from Nahan and Richards's
movements could be closely followed through telescope. There was no way
of signaling, because no code of flags had been arranged. Martindell
therefore sent another, very urgent note.
Then, soon after noon, two things happened, which completely
changed the whole tactical situation. First, news arrived that Richards's spare
ammunition had been lost; and then the engagement of Peacock Hill began.
137
The spectators in Nahan were sickened by their powerlessness to avert what
seemed certain tragedy. But soon a buzz of excitement broke the agonized
silence. They realized that Richards was holding his position. There was
perhaps still time to send fresh ammunition from camp. Soon it was obvious
not only that he could be saved, but also that he could be given the means of
securing a victory. Eagerly, a young subaltern called Robert Stevenson
volunteered to take a couple of companies with spare cartridges to Peacock
Hill. But events had moved too fast for the General. Incredibly, he declined
the offer, and merely continued to send Richards orders to retreat.
Martindell's reflexes were so paralysed and his imagination was so
impoverished, that he was completely incapable of grasping the significance
of the developments on Peacock Hill. Having begun with the assumption that
Richards could succeed only if Ludlow succeeded, his mind remained
prisoner to that idea and simply refused to register the visible evidence,
which plainly indicated that Richards could succeed in spite of Ludlow's
failure, provided he was sent reinforcements and ammunition without delay. It
never occurred to him that the failure of the operation on the left ridge only
made it the more essential to exploit the success on the right, and that by
continuing to send orders to retreat instead of men and cartridges he would
not only ruin a splendid opportunity but probably bring about a disaster. With
egregious stupidity, he took no heed of the likelihood of one of his missives
arriving after dark and compelling a party of exhausted men without
ammunition to retreat blindly, by hair's-breadth mountain pathways, with an
enemy three times their number in pursuit.
It is axiomatic that in all tactical withdrawals the most dangerous role is
that of the covering party. For them, success in a gamble against
overpowering odds is only the prelude to even greater jeopardy, because
their acutest peril comes only after they have held the enemy at bay for the
benefit of the main party, when they have to withdraw themselves. Richards
was now faced with the invidious task of selecting a corps to fulfill this
suicidal function. He chose Thackeray's company, because they still had
most of their ammunition unused, this having been kept in reserve for any
accident. It is said that Thackeray ignored the pleas of some of his men, who
urged him to make his way back to camp and leave them to do the job alone.
He and William Wilson, the twenty –two-year-old Ensing of his regiment,
were devoted friends. They had mode wills in favour of each other to
symbolize their attachment. Inspired by Thickeray's determination, Wilson
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insisted on staying too. They were joined by Ensign Stalkert of the 1st/13th
Native Infantry, and by William Turner, Ensign of the 1st/27th. Stalkert and
Turner were supported by a good proportion of sepoys from their own
companies, but all told there were scarcely 200 men to resist 1,500.
Thickeray formed two squares on heights commanding the escape route. He
and Wilson remained with the one in advance, while Turner commanded the
one of the rear. The men fixed their bayonets and performed prodigies of
valour in an effort to stem the enemy advance until the main force was clear.
Behind them, there was a frenzied stampede as the narrow pathway down
form Peacock Hill became choked with men. Mercifully, the night was fine
and the way lit by a brilliant, brittle disc of moon.
The covering party managed to keep the Nepalese at bay for half an
hour, but then Thickeray's group was forced to retreat, in a desperate bid to
escape encirclement. Soon half of them had been shot down, and the rest
were surrounded. As they made a dash and tried to cut their way free,
Thickeray was hit in the chest by a bullet, and collapsed. Realizing that he
was finished, he told Wilson to take command; but Wilson himself was soon
felled by a musket ball which shattered his thigh. The Nepalese swarmed
everywhere. Men not killed were captured, and only seven of Thickeray's
company escaped. The command now developed on Turner, who, realizing
that there was nothing more he could do, shouted to his men to disperse.
They fled in every direction, running and stumbling to the limit of their
strength into the night.
The first men of the main column limped into Nahan at one o'clock the
next morning, giddy from hunger and fatigue; but the remnants of the
covering party straggled in for days afterwards. One group had fled
northwards, to the Giri Ganga river, where they were found by friendly
villagers, who fed them and guided them back to camp. Another forty were
taken prisoner. Despite the threat of death, they refused to enter the enemy
service and were finally released on parole the following day. Ranjor Singh
sent in the wounded, a courtesy unknown in India; but many of the bodies
recovered had been mutilated. Wilson had been helped away by Turner but,
weak from loss of blood, had been unable to go far. Turner but gone on alone
to find help. He had soon been accosted by a small party of Nepalese, and
threw himself down a precipice and crawled into a cave to escape capture.
Thereafter he had wandered lost and hungry in the jungle for two days. At
last he was found by an old peasant woman, who fled him and had her son
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lead him back to Nahan. Turner never forgot her kindness, and had a
pension settled on her for life. He gave some indication concerning Wilson's
whereabouts, but the Ensign was not found alive. Thickeray's body was not
recovered for several days. All the officers of the camp, including the MajorGeneral, were at his funeral, and none could hide his emotion. The surviving
sepoys of his company defined the strictest rules of caste to bury him with
their own hands. Moved as he had seldom been in all his long military career,
Hastings issued a special example animated his little band to as daring an
effort of zeal and courage as ever distinguished any portion of the Bengal
Native Infantry; and, His Excellency may say, any description of troops
whatever'.
The total of Richard's casualties was 306-well over half his force. Of
these, eighty-one, including three officers (Thickeray, Wilson and Stalkert),
were killed. Hastings was amazed by Martindell's behavior. The Commanderin-Chief concludes', ran a sarcastic letter from the Adjutant-General, 'that
some insuperable objection must have intervened to prevent your supporting
either column, or taking measures to cover its retreat, after you were
apprised of the failure of Major Ludlow's attack'. It was later learnt that, had
Richards persevered, the enemy would have abandoned Jaithak early the
next morning.
This double calamity was all the more vexing because it made it
essential to strengthen the Sirmur division. By virtually denuding the stations
of Hansi and Rewari and by detaching a battalion from his own escort,
Hastings was able to muster a reinforcement of twenty-one companies of
infantry, or nearly 2,000 men. But casualties, desertions, sickness and the
detachment of troops for the occupation of Dehra Dun had reduced the
original strength of the force by over a half, and even after the arrival of
eleven companies of his reinforcement Martindell had only 2,700 effective
men at his disposal. True, he also had Fraser's irregulars, but he placed little
faith in them. Nervous and downcast after the disaster of 27 December, he
complained that his force was too small for its assignment. Jaithak was, he
knew, expecting reinforcements, because Bal Bahadur Singh had left
Chamur and gone to a new stronghold at Jauntgarh, on the east bank of the
Jumna behind Dehra Dun, whence Major Baldock, with a party of troops from
Dehra, had failed to dislodge him. It could only be a matter of time before he
reached Jaithak. Dispatches in this querulous vein elicited no sympathy from
Headquarters.
140
Hitherto [observed the Adjutant-General acidly] it had not been the habit of
Company officers to calculate whether they have a numerical superiority to
the enemy. The introduction of a principle so novel and so infallibly
destructive to our Empire can never be admitted by the Commander-in-Chief.
But his Lordship directs me to say, that were this species of computation
allowed, he apprehends it could not apply in your case, as he believes your
numbers to be considerably beyond those of Ranjor and Bal Bahadur Singh
united. When you represent the advantages of Ranjor Singh's position, His
Lordship thinks it escapes you that a situation which presents peculiar
difficulties of approach must be one to which the means of egress and
communications are equally embarrassing when the skill of an antagonist is
deployed in availing itself of these obstacles.
I am instructed to say that it is the province of the Commander-in-Chief
to weigh the possibility of the enemy's receiving reinforcements. To you, His
Lordship looks for the vigorous employment of such force as the ability of the
state affords the means of furnishing to you. Did you fell the nature of your
command too embarrassing to you, which His Lordship would be deeply loath
to imagine, it would be incumbent on you to express it; for in holding it . . .
you are pledged to your country to aim with your utmost energy at the
fulfillment of its objects.
Martindell was quite crushed by this rebuke, and he offered his
resignation. The offer reached Headquarters within a fortnight; but no reply
was sent for another two weeks, and it was not until the end of March that
Martindell knew of the Commander-in-Chief's decision regarding it. The
sense of uncertainty under which he worked in the meantime hardly helped to
make his leadership more assured.
In the first week of the New Year the weather turned very cold, and
there were some stormy nights. The enemy's misery was worsened by
inertia, because all activity now ceased, pending the arrival of reinforcements
and the transportation of the heavy guns to Nahan. The road from the park to
the plateau was pronounced ready on 31 December, but experience proved
otherwise. After prolonged efforts to get the guns up this pathway the attempt
had to he abandoned as hopeless, because there were too many turnings to
give scope for even pull. A new, straighter road had to be started on another
part of the rock, and was not expected to be ready until the end of February.
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Meanwhile, the Nepalese strengthened their defences by constructing
another stockade on the left ridge.
While Martindell awaited his reinforcements and his guns, he had all
the approaches to Jaithak reconnoitered, only to find them apparently
impassable for artillery. This confirmed him in his resolution to suspend all
operations until the heavy guns had arrived at Nahan-though quite how he
expected this to alter his predicament it is difficult to understand, if all roads
from there to the heights were reckoned impracticable. He can hardly have
contemplated bombardment from Nahan, over three miles' distance, when at
Kalanga it had failed over 800 yards. As Ludlow saw it, he had become so
obsessed with silly fears concerning the safety of his guns that he was
incapable of thinking of anything else until he had them in the town, and all
his attentions had become engrossed by the progress of the road. Probably
he found a welcome means of escape from the real problems of command,
without, however, abandoning all semblance of involvement, by busying
himself with preparations for the removal of the artillery park. Ludlow
confessed he had no idea what the Major-General's ultimate plans were, and
'positively had the fidgits' as he waited for evidence of some tactical purpose
to emerge from his dithering.
There is but one road now by which we can get up decently [he wrote to his
wife on January 30th] and from this we may be cut off, or, what is worse,
perhaps obliged to attempt it with great loss, if we give the enemy more time
to defend it . . . I know you must have been in expectation of something
decisive having taken place' ere this, whereas we are less prepared to set
about it than we were on the 29th of last fore any additional defences were
made. In my humble opinion, these great delays are the causes of all our
failures; they not only betray the poverty of our resources, and give the
enemy time to strengthen theirs; but they moreover damp the spirit of our
troops from the very inaction incident to them.
William Fraser, the Political Agent, was even more exasperated by
Martindell's procrastination. Never were two characters less compatible.
Fraser, a young laird of Inverness, was garrulous, opinionated and highly
extrovert. He was destined to die at an assassin's hand, as unconventionally
as he had lived. Although he had chosen to make his career in the
Company's civil service, temperamentally he belonged to its army. An
intimate friend of James Skinner, he loved to pose as a military expert, and
142
modeled himself on the old-style 'Hindu' officers, more common in the days of
Clive than now, who wore whiskers in imitation of their sepoys, abjured pork
and beef, and hunted big-game on foot. Irresistibly attracted to any affray, he
had accompanied Gillespie to the assault of Kalanga on 31 October and
received a serious arrow wound in the neck. Metcalfe, whose Assistant he
was at the Delhi Residency, found him ungovernable and full of wild ideas;
but the younger and more zestful Company officers, Ludlow and Frederich
Young especially, readily to his outspoken views. His imagination and vitality
would have operated as healthy antidotes to Martindell's diffidence had not
the General been unresponsive to all advice save that of the officers of the
53rd, and had Fraser's own manner not been so much less persuasive than
outrageous.
Finding the inhabitants of northern Sirmur (of the provinces of Jubal
and Jaunsar especially) to be more spirited and seditious than those of
Garhwal, Fraser planned a partisan army for the interior, with himself as
commandant. Krishna Singh, now in camp, whom he found 'a remarkable
character for activity and bravery', he proposed should be his assistant; but
after the disasters of 27 December Headquarters cancelled both this project
and all plans for the detachment of regular troops into the interior. Martindell
was nevertheless instructed to provide whatever irregulars he could spare to
support the rebels, and to encourage them to harass foraging parties from
Jaithak.
The irregular force, the brainchild of Fraser and commanded by his
close friend, Lieutenant Frederick Young, was by now over 4,000 strong. But
less than half were paharis (hill men). The failure of the local inhabitants to
come forward in larger numbers was, in Fraser's opinion, a clear indication
that the British had done more harm than good to their cause by advertising
their policy of restoration. As far as he could see, the presence of the son of
the dispossessed Raja of Sirmur in the British camp, with several of the royal
family's civil officers, was, far from encouraging local resistance to the
Gurkhas, tending to confirm the people in their present allegiance. This was
especially so in the inhabitants of Jubal, among whom enthusiasm for the
Company's was was tempered by the fear that in the event of its victory they
would be made subjects of the Sirmur house-a prospect they dreaded even
more than domination by the Gurkhas. Even in Sirmur proper Ranjor Singh
Thapa was far more popular than the old royal family. The upshot had been
that recourse had to be made to lowlands of various descriptions-Sikhs,
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Pathans and Mewatis mostly-to swell the numbers of the irregular contingent.
It was therefore a tatterdemalion band, hastily raised, hardly trained, racial
and religiously heterogeneous, and, what is more, issued with ancient
matchlock muskets, loaded cumbrously with separate shot and powder,
instead of modern flintlocks and cartridges. Martindell can hardly be blamed
for having had little confidence in them.
Nevertheless, it was a band of these irregulars which broke the long
tedium of inactivity and set the army in motion again, by means of a minor but
notable success against the enemy. Some 375 were posted on an eminence
called Boneta, about nine miles west of Nahan, to help intercept Nepali
foraging parties. At day-break on 31 January, they were attacked by about
250 of Ranjor Singh's choice warriors. They acquitted themselves splendidly,
not only repulsing the enemy, but also killing twenty-three and wounding
many. Ludlow waited restlessly for Martindell to react to this opportunity; but
the General pondered and dithered, and it seemed that it must be lost. On 1
February, however, the irregulars actually moved forward to the western end
of the ridge and occupied, unaided, a prominent height called Nauni, which
was about three miles from the fort. Reassured by this unexpected
performance, Martindell finally made up his mind to venture another attempt
to occupy the left ridge. At eight o'clock the same night he sent mountain
guns, transported by bearers, were sent after him-but no field ordnance,
because the road was reckoned impracticable for elephants. It was a grueling
march; only between eight and ten miles in length, but of full eighteen hours'
duration. At about eleven o'clock on the following morning, all the troops
remaining in camp were turned out and paraded under arms on the northeastern point of the Nahan plateau, in order to draw the enemy's attentions
from Kelly. The feint was successful, for the Nepalese hurriedly made a
stockade in the supposed path of this force and Kelly joined the irregulars on
Nauni upopposed. 'This move I heartily rejoice at, for I was afraid our general
was asleep and would have given time to the enemy to prevent our getting up
at all', there is every chance of our getting possession of Jaithak within ten
days.'
But fortune never smiled on Martindell. No sooner had the movement
been completed than a change in the weather threatened to thwart his
hesitant initiative and drive him back even deeper into his limbo of
despondency and disappointment. The wind rose, the sky darkened, the
temperature dropped, and it began to rain. It rained continuously for three
144
days and nights. It was heavy, glacial rain, driven by raging winds. Tents
were dragged down; notepaper became so damp that the ink would not dry;
the light was so bad that at three o'clock in the afternoon it was impossible to
write or read without a candle; and all the time, everywhere, was the sound of
running water.
On bleak Nauni hill the sufferings of the sepoys were pitiful, Kelly had
marched it haste, without tents or spare provisions, and it proved impossible
to send these up to him while the vile weather lasted. His men huddled
abjectly under makeshift shelters, which they formed by throwing their
blankets over bars supported by crossed sticks at either end, like roasting
spits; but the kamals were made little fuel for cooking, and even the few
scraps of timber that were found provided too damp to ignite. By the third day
twenty sepoys and twelve bearers had died of exposure and scores were
seriously ill.
Martindell grived, and wrung his hands. He would probably have
abandoned the position altogether had he not received a note from Major
Baldock on 5 February, which said that Bal Bahadur, whom Baldock had
been trailing, had eluded him altogether and crossed the Tons river- the last
major obstacle in his progress to Jaithak. This meant that a reinforcement of
between five and six hundred men was about to reach the fort. The weather
cleared for a few hours on the same day, and John Ludlow, with his own
battalion, a six-pounder and two mountain guns, was sent to relieve Kelly.
Kelly's drenched and shivering detachment arrived back in camp that night,
thirty of the men on stretchers.
At about eight that night, after Ludlow had reached his destination, the
deluge begun again.
I have not got your daily dispatch to me, [he wrote to his wife on 7 February]
nor could I well expect it in such weather as we have had, it never having
ceased for a moment to rain ever since we have been up here. It has been
very trying for the troops, especially those who have been exposed to it
without any covering at all [probably the irregulars]. Thank God today we
have had a few hours of dry weather, and as the sun is peeping out I trust it
will favour us with its genial influence, for never did poor fellows want it more.
Many of the servants as well as sepoys have fallen sacrifice to the
inclemency of the weather, and I had just now a report of one of my poor
bearers, a Bangwalla, having died coming up. With regard to myself, I never
145
was better, although I have been without a bed and have not changed my
clothes these three days. This is not weather that severely injures the
constitution of Europeans, but natives cannot stand such cold. I'm told that it
snowed here for an hour last night, but as it lay not on the ground' till morning
I did not witness it.
I feel much more contended up here than I was below . . . I have the
honour to maintain a post here with 400 men which has been previously held
by 1,200. It is a very strong one indeed, and provided the elements do but
favor us would be impregnable to any force the Gurkhas would sent against
us. We have, besides my own force, 1,100 irregulars which will prove of merit
and [? – illegible] in case of attack. But the enemy know the strength of our
position too well and have too much dread of our guns to make any such
attempt. They are withal full 3 miles distant from us with a large dale between
us and them.
On the 8th, the rain turned first to hail and then to snow, which soon lay
three inches thick on the tents and in drifts of three feet on the ground. At
Nahan, the Europeans were in their element, pelting each other with
snowballs; but the natives, who had never seen snow before, were
flabbergasted and miserable. Nor were the lowland sheep and cattle of the
commissariat any happier. 'The cattle are dying and lying in all directions',
wrote Sherwood; '800 sheep are reported dead belonging to our regiment.'
On Nauni hill the snow was even deeper, and Ludlow's force became
completely cut off. Supplies and reinforcements could not be sent to it for five
days.
Since 4 o'clock yesterday [he told his wife on the 9th] we have had neither
snow nor rain, but an exceeding hard frost; and the snow is now on the
trodden roads so many cakes of solid ice. The stupendous hills around all
covered with snow present to Europeans a grand and congenial sight- but not
so to the natives. Fuel as you may suppose is exceedingly scare, and it is
here so especially, there being no other tree but the fir, which is not
particularly numerous . . . There is this advantage in fir, that it burns readily
green, from the quantity of turpentine which is in it. I am greatly in hopes from
the clear appearance of the weather, and [it] being withal new moon today,
that all bad weather is at an end. Most sincerely do I trust so on account of
the troops, who have suffered every privation, and I must say with
unexampled constancy.
146
Finally, the sun came, and the sound of trickling water was heard
again. On 10 February the road was considered passable, and a
reinforcement of 450 sepoys, with another three six-pounders, was sent to
Ludlow under Captain Watson. The paths, however, were still very slushy,
and two elephants slipped over precipices and were killed. 'The road is
difficult beyond measures; everyone [is] wishing that Lord [Hastings] would
look at it' wrote Sherwood feelingly. After the junction of the reinforcement the
spirits of the troops at Nauni were high, and his men told Ludlow that if he
would lead the way to Jaithak, they would follow.
But there was little likelihood of his doing that. Martindell had no
intention of allowing Ludlow to burn his fingers twice. Now that he had,
almost in spite of himself, got artillery on to one of the ridges, the
bombardment of Jaithak again seemed feasible and his decision to reduce
the fort by this means appeared justified after all. From now on, Martindell
clung to the notion of bombardment with a desperate faith and refused to be
distracted by any incidental opportunities for other forms of tactics. He simply
ignored the fact that, to be successful, bombardment needed to be combined
with a blockade; that unless the enemy were prevented from escaping, the
guns might merely drive them to another hill to the rear, where I would
perhaps be impossible to attack them.
The Nepali defences on the left ridge were now increased to two
stockades, and the Major-General had to obliterate these before he could
move his guns up the ridge and bombard the fort. On 12 February, all the
light infantry companies were sent up to Nauni with two heavy mortars, and
Ludlow was instructed to advance about 1,100 yards to an eminence called
Black Hill, which, it was judged, would be a good position for a battery.
Irregulars under Frederick Young were left to guard Nauni. But before the
bombardment of the stockades could begin, two things happened. Bal
Bahadur finally entered Jaithak, and Ranjor Singh's men occupied Peacock
Hill, the important position on the right ridge which Richards had been
ordered to abandon on 28 December.
Bal Bahadur reached the fort that same evening, 12 February. 'He
ought to have been prevented long ago', grumbled Ludlow, who witnessed
the entry from Black Hill. Estimates of the strength of this reinforcement
varied. Pessimists of the 53rd, like Sherwood, reckoned that the force was
700; while Fraser, less alarmist, realized that the number could not exceed
147
400 at the most. When Headquarters demanded to know why Bal Bahadur
had not been intercepted, Martindell blamed Major Baldock.
It is a fact that he derived little collateral co-operation from the force in
Dehra Dun. As far back as December, Lieutenant-Colonel Carpenter, left in
charge there, had been told to give priority to an attack on Chauur, where Bal
Bahadur was then lodged. But Carpenter's force is so small-only just over
200 strong-that he had felt compelled to wait for reinforcements before
beginning operations. In the meantime Bal Bahadur had moved west to
Jauntgarh and here, in early January, had successfully resisted the efforts of
400 regulars and 600 irregulars under Major Baldock to dislodge him. Soon
afterwards he had moved on again, still westwards, towards Jaithak. He had
been harassed by some local partisans of Jaunsar district on his way to the
Tons river; but Baldock's force, hampered by deep snow and the ruggedness
of the country, had been too far behind to afford any support, so the elusive
Gurkha had crossed the river with little trouble. Troops from the Dun did not
attack Jauntgarh again until 11 March, when the remaining garrison of about
300 withdrew eastwards across the Baghirati river. Chamur was not attacked
by a British force until 20 March, when its occupants to retreated across the
Baghirati. Both the expelled groups made their way to Srinagar in east
Garhwal, now become the new enemy rallying point.
Now that the fort had had its garrison increased, mastery of Peacock
Hill, which commanded the wells on the right ridge, was of crucial importance
to Ranjor Singh Thapa, and he sent men to fortify the peak. 'It ought to have
been taken possession of by us long ago', seethed Ludlow; 'I wish in Heaven
the General would show a little more activity and not give the enemy time to
add to his defences.' He wanted to open his mortars to distract the
Nepalese's attention from their stockade-building, to which proposal
Martindell reacted by announcing that he was coming up to Black Hill to
examine the position for himself.
His visit as made on 14 February, when, in consultation with Mawby,
now his alter ego, he fixed on a spot at the foot of Black Hill, about 300 feet
below Ludlow's present position and some thousand yards distant from the
nearest Nepalese stockade, as the site for the batteries. The emplacements
were duly constructed that night, but Ludlow received no orders to put the
guns in. the Major-General had been suddenly distracted by a report that 500
Nepalese from Amar Singh Thapa were on their way towards Jaithak.
148
Trembling for the safety of his artillery park, he suspended all operations on
the left ridge and even recalled news of this recall as 'the most discouraging
information based on the strangest reasoning [he] ever heard of', because
the route of the Nepalese was supposed to lead them directly by his own
position, while the Major-General had a force at least four times their
estimated numbe in Nahan. No confirmation being received of the report, two
six-pounders were carried down to the batteries on the 16th. Fire was opened
on the 18th, when the two mortars were also in position; but by then
Martindell, advised by Mawby and Captain Battine, the artillery officer, had
decided that the distance of the batteries from the stockades was too great
for light ordnance to have any effect and that the eighteen-pounders would
have to be brought up.
At this stage, the battering guns were not even as far as Nahan, and it
was only on the 19th that the road on which the pioneers had been laboring
for three weeks was pronounced ready. It took 200 men two days to get both
guns up, so the operation, an object of general wonder and interest, was not
completed until the evening of 20 February. Work on continuing the road to
Black Hill was started on the 18th.
Meanwhile, the reinforcement from Amar Singh Thapa was again
reported to be approaching and Frederick Young, with Krishna Sing and
2,000 irregulars, was sent from Nauni to intercept it. They left Nauni on the
morning of 19 February and struck due north, making for the Sain range of
mountains, stretching horizontally behind Jaithak, where Young expected to
encounter the enemy party. After a march of fourty-eight hours, he finally
caught up with his prey at nightfall on the 20th, at a place called Chanalgarh,
15 miles from Jaithak and overhanging a deep chasm through which the Jelal
river tumbled in noisy cataracts. He scribbled a hasty note to Ludlow; 'I am at
length up with the enemy, but he has got such a post I really know not what
to do. His force does not consist at present of more than 500 fighting men
and a number of followers. We have upwards of 2,000. Is it not a shame? But
I fear if I was to order an assault the men would not go on-at least so Krishna
Singh says. I am really so tired I cannot keep my eyes open, so excuse this
short epistle. We had the Devil's own march . . . .'
Krishna Singh had in fact lost his nerve, and far from being of
assistance to Young was nearly the cause of his destruction. The irregulars
held the enemy party in check during the night, but on the morning of the 21st
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the Nepalese made a sudden effort to break the blockade. They fired a few
volleys and then drew their khukuris, to try to cut their way free. Suddenly the
rumour flew around the ranks of Young's force that a reinforcement of 2,000
enemy troops from Jaithak was at hand. The notion was absurd. Jaithak was
fully fifteen miles away, and there were not that many troops in the place; but
it wrought panic among the irregulars, who threw down their arms and fled.
They were hotly pursed. Many fell to their death over precipices; others were
either slaughtered or mutilated by the Nepalese knives. 180 were killed and
273 wounded, and nearly 1,500 deserted either there and then or
subsequently. Krishna Singh attempted to extenuate the flight by claiming
that the enemy had numbered between 1,200 and 1,400; and there was little
reason to doubt that he had been the author of the pernicious rumour
concerning reinforcements.
This unfortunate affair widened beyond repair the rift between Fraser
and Martindell. Fraser refused to abandon the irregulars, and arrogantly
reaffirmed his faith in them. He laid most of the blame for the catastrophe on
Krishna Singh, 'who', he claimed, 'from incorrect information or personal
apprehension fabricated and used a mischievous falsehood'. Young said that
such a heterogeneous and inadequately trained band should never have
been employed without a seasoning of regulars to inspire and support them,
but Fraser disagreed. He even disputed the superiority of the Nepalese'
flintlocks over the irregulars' old matchlocks. Martindell, on the other hand,
was vexed and mortified to think that he had ever been led to trust the
irregulars. 'I can no longer place any dependence on the few troops of this
description who remain,' he wrote firmly, refusing to listen to Fraser and
discriminate in favour of the mountain soldier at least. The Political Agent
went off in a huff, and conducted his own inquiry into this affair. He submitted
a questionnaire to Young, and then, having embellished Young's replies with
his own comments, sent the document to Headquarters without bothering
even to inform the Major-General.
At the end of February, Fraser heard that the elders of Jubal province
were at last stirring and needed arms and men. He suggested that a force of
irregulars be sent, proposing to accompany them himself; and martindell,
glad to be rid of him, agreed. Departure was delayed for some time by the
demoralized and refractory state of the irregulars. New levies were no sooner
added than droves more deserted, reducing the mean strength of the corps
to about 1,400, and detachments showed themselves timid and unsteady in
150
face of even the most trivial hazards. When Fraser finally left camp, with 450
men on 15 March, Martindell heaved a sigh of relief. But his respite was
short. Hastings was growing very disturbed at his fecklessness, and began to
bombard him with unpleasant missives. On 11 February, the AdjutantGeneral wrote:
The Commander-in-Chief . . . [expresses] . . . . his anxiety that Colonel
Octherlony should derive the aid of a more active cooperation from the force
under your command, and His Excellency trusts you will speedily endeavour
to afford it to him after the First Battalion, the 15th Native Infantry shall have
arrived.
On 25 February he wrote:
His Excellency cannot but view with increasing anxiety the appearance of
continued inactivity in your proceedings. The reinforcements which have
been sent to your division at such an inconvenience to the public service, and
the large addition which has been made through the zeal and activity of Mr.
Fraser to the irregular force . . . amounting, His Excellency understands, to
about 3,684 men, have authorized the expectation of results commensurate
to so great a preponderance of strength.
And on 1 March:
The Commander-in-Chief observes that your last is dated from Nahan, and
not being aware of any advantage which that place affords as a headquarters
while operations are going on . . . requests to be informed of the reasons
which induce your remaining so long at that place. As a position it appears to
His Excellency to engross an undue share of solicitude, as well as a much
larger portion of your force than circumstances seem to warrant or require.
The advanced state of the season; the little expectation your
despatches hold out of any speedy commencement of active operations,
notwithstanding the large force at your disposal, cannot but fill the mind of the
Commander-in-Chief with unusual anxiety for the public interests so deeply
involved in the success of the army under your command. In the absence,
therefore, of all positive and specific information as to your present plans and
intentions, I am directed by the Commander-in-Chief to request you will state
fully and explicitly what you propose to do towards the accomplishment of the
service which has been specially entrusted to your direction.
151
Wearily, Martindell strove to impress on his unfeeling chief the nature of
the difficulties and deficiencies with which he was having to contend-poor,
even useless intelligence; terrain difficult beyond the conception of those who
did not actually see it; and, worst of all, lack of men. He insisted that he must
guard Nahan, because it was his magazine, depot, treasury and link with the
plains, and he claimed that he had no troops to spare for the occupation of
the heights north-east of Jaithak, which was essential if the place was to be
blockaded until it could be bombarded. The badness of his intelligence and
the obstructions of the ground cannot be disputed; but it was absurd to plead
insufficiency of troops. By this time he had at his disposal some 6,000
regulars alone, while Ranjor, with all his reinforcements, could not have had
more than 2,000 men of all descriptions. The principle behind his operations
was, he repeated, bombardment; but by now he was so nervous that as his
plans matured, his confidence in them drained away. Calculations of success
began to change into prefigurations of failure and he became inhibited by
false premonitions. 'The ground along the whole ridge is very unfavourable,
being so narrow as not to admit a company to form abreast', he observed in
his dispatch of 1 March, 'and the point on which Jaithak is built is of such
steep ascent that in the event of a breach being effected the result of an
assault will be very doubtful.'
It was his misfortune that he was surrounded by King's officers who,
instead of providing opinions against which he could measure his own and
find them false, shared his lack of confidence and so gave a semblance of
corroboration to misgavings which were in fact quite unjustified. On 6 March
he again asked to be allowed to resign his command if the explanations he
had provided proved unsatisfactory. Hastings made it plain that they did
prove so; but he forbore to dismiss Martindell 'because', the Adjutant-General
explained coldly, 'there would be no explaining the procedure so that it
should not carry with it, to the conception of the public, an unqualified
condemnation of your conduct'. Dissatisfied as the Commander-in-Chief was,
he intended his admonitions more as a private stimulant than as a formal
verdict. But the plain truth was that Hastings had no option but to bear with
Martindell, because there was no officers of sufficient rank available to
succeed him.
The progress of the road from Nahan to Black Hill was bedeviled by
vacillation. It was begun along a route designed to utilize part of the course of
the Markanda river, but on 23 February some bearers and camp followers
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were cut off and plundered in the ravine between Nahan and Jaithak by a
party of Nepalese using the watercourses as shelter. This mishap persuaded
Martindell that the route was too hazardous, so it was abandoned for another,
more to the west. After two days this was found to be even more exposed to
enemy raids. Work was therefore resumed on the first road, much to
Ludlow's exasperation. 'I like not this chopping and changing in a
commander. It bespeaks so much indecision-a quality which I expected not to
find a General M, tho' I now perceive he has it in an impardonable degree. In
truth his whole command has been a comedy of errors throughout-or perhaps
a tragicomedy you may term it'. The next day, the 27th, two engineers went
down to examine the road and were promptly fired on by a lurking party of
Nepali snipers. They consequently reported the road to be far too dangerous,
and yet another was begun, this time about midway between the two
abandoned ones. For some days work continued uninterrupted, but officers
of the 53rd were still uneasy, maintaining that the road passed too closely
under the enemy stockades on the crest of the ridge for comfort. As always,
the Major-General finally came round to their way of thinking, and on 2 March
he ordered the engineers to turn the road to the left 'to save the troops [from]
being unnecessarily exposed'. So the pioneers and the fatigue parties
labored on, always expecting fresh, capricious change of plan, and now
sweltering in warm weather. Spring in the north Indian hills is the nearest
thing to paradise that sinful man can know, and in the exiled Briton the wild
apple blossom, the awakened bees, the returning cuckoos and the aromatic
breezes evoke a poignant, bitter-sweet nostalgia. But for the Britons
campaigning in 1815, these things all had an ominous significance. They
were warnings that the season was warning fast: advanced harbingers of the
monsoon, during which all operations would have to be abandoned.
While the road for the eighteen-pounders was being made, the
Nepalese constructed yet a third stockade on the left ridge, in advance of the
second and just their side of the ruined village of Jampta. The distance was
still too great for the British ordnance to hinder them, and the arrival of the
battering guns was awaited on Black Hill with mounting impatience. John
Ludlow found an escape from the boredom of inactivity by continuing to
unburden himself in letters to his beloved and devoted wife at Meerut, to
whom he described how the road finally approached completion.
Camp, Black Hill, 7th March.
153
I am happy to say that the General is now working most seriously and
with effect on the road for the 18 pounders. They have not as yet got to the
next rocky part, but hopes are entertained that if it cannot be cut through . . .
the road may so brought over the summit of the hill that an 18 pounder may
eventually be got over it. If this even cam be managed, a month instead of
two would then finish the work-nay, if he increase the working party with
Europeans, which he yesterday did, it may be got through perhaps quicker . .
. . But under any circumstance, the delays are most impolitic, [as] evidenced
by the enemy throwing up their today's stockade. It will cost more lives to
drive them from this than we could have lost in bringing up the guns by a
road more direct.
Camp, Black Hill, 8th March, 1815
I am happy to say, my Love, that a hint from Head Qurs has made our
General exert himself a little, and he has further 3 days past put upwards of
500 men as a working party on his favorite road. But dint of exploring and
perseverance they will manage I hope to get the guns over the pinnacle of a
rocky hill which it would have been in vain for them [to attempt] by the regular
footpath. There may be some danger in bringing the guns over after the road
is made, owing to the narrowness of the ridge; but the practicability of this I
shall be better able to tell you tomorrow, as Smith, the Chief Engineer, is
gone down to look at it, and I shall have his report tonight about it. Stevenson
seems to think it may be finished in ten days . . . That will be quite a relief to
us, for when these fine guns are up matters will go on famously-provided only
that our commander takes advantage of circumstances and does not permit
the enemy to retreat to other ranges of hills further back, which they have
already contemplated and will do if not hindered.
Camp, Black Hill, March 11th
The road is very nearly finished: but there are yet two places in it so
steep and rugged that the artillery officer, Captain Battine, thinks the guns
cannot be brought over them without some alteration. This possibly may
occasion a few additional days' delay. I suspect the General will be wishing
bye and bye that he had commenced on the road more direct, for that would
have been finished many days ago, and the guns, by reason of its gradual
ascent, very easily got up. But the working party getting through the road [as]
they have done, have performed wonders.
154
Camp, Black Hill, Sunday, March 11th
Our road for the guns is again subject to some alterations, and it will
depend on the General whether this alteration shall take a fortnight or two
days' additional work. The General, without seeing the road, has ordered it to
be turned-i.e., taken round the rugged part; whereas the engineers have
recommended it to be scalped-i.e., the pinnacle to be taken off. The latter will
require two days to execute, so that in 6 days altogether it might possibly be
finished.
The engineers apparently prevailed this time, because the road was
pronounced ready on 13 March. It was five miles along, with many high
humps and low dips after it quitted the Markanda valley and zigzagged
across the craggy skirt of the left ridge. Many parts were little more than
spaces cleared of vegetation and loose stones, where hollows in the ground
had been filled up and smoothed; elsewhere it was a footpath widened by
cutting back the bank and artificially raising the outer edge. Its ascent up the
flank of the ridge, following the straightest of possible routes, appeared from
a distance almost perpendicular and dizzily precipitous. In one place it
followed the narrow spine of a rocky spur which jutted out from the ridge like
a natural buttress, with an immense cavity on either side. 'It may reasonably
be doubted', wrote James Baillie Fraser, brother of the Political Agent, who
arrived in camp on 14 March, 'if ever till this period it had been contemplated
to drag guns of such heavy metal up precipices so high and rugged, and over
so many of them.
The eighteen-pounders were moved from Nahan at daybreak on 14
March, 200 soldiers of the 53rd and a party of gun lascars allotted to each
gun. Martindell was in agonies of apprehension for their safety. The whole
army was put under arms and Colonel Kelly sent with a battalion of sepoys
and two six-pounders to cover the road-'and for what? Because, forsooth, our
General was fearful the Gurkhas would come and run away with them!'
snorted Ludlow. In truth, the General need not have imposed such an
additional strain on the army. The Nepalese were far too engrossed by the
spectacle to interrupt it. Hundreds came out of the fort and watched the
operation, as if mesmerized into a state of horrified fascination. First the guns
were let down the northern face of Nahan Hill, each held back by its team of
Europeans, and guided by lascars with levers on either side. They were then
moved along the course of the Markanda, the easies stretch of the route, and
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brought to the road proper, which branched away towards the ridge. Progress
was painfully slow, and the guns were brought only halfway on the first day.
During the 15th the army was again kept under arms while the operation was
completed. James Baillie Fraser watched from a distance as the first gun
moved up to the crest of the spur:
Main strength was necessary to drag it up the straight road which viewed at a
distance, seemed perpendicular; and the men in detail, with the ropes and
guns attached, appeared right up and down on its face. On the edge of steep
precipices, again, more caution was necessary; for then, had the huge
engine swerved the least to one side, it must have tumbled down to the gulf
below, whence it could never have been recovered, and probably many lives
must have been lost with it. Several times I trembled as I saw it verge
towards the edge and the ground crumble beneath it; but it moved on
majestically, following the mass of men that drew it . . . and on the morning of
the next day the two heavy guns were placed in battery.148
They opened fire on the morning of 17 March, aimed at the nearest
stockade, and continued open for two days. On the evening of the 18th the
stockade was still standing and a deserter reported that the total of the
enemy's casualties did not exceed half a dozen. Bombardment was again
being beset by the problem of aim. The stockade emerged only some five
feet above the ground, and any hits on so small a target at 800 yards were
due more to luck than to science. But the artillerists persevered, and by the
next evening some effect was at last visible. The stockade itself appeared to
be in ruins, and his more vigorous officers advised Martindell to assault. The
Major-General refused, insisting that the trenches, which extended from each
side of the stockade over the flanks of the ridge, were still too strongly
defended. Instead, he ordered the construction of another battery for the
eighteen-pounders at a point about 350 yards from the nearest stockade and
to the right of Jampta village. A special path had to be cleared along the ridge
for this purpose, and the first gun could not be moved up until daylight on the
20th. By the evening the stockade was a pile of smoking debris; but there
were still Nepalese in the trenches and the gun parties were now within range
of their musketry. Twenty-two casualties had already been sustained, and the
Company officers urged Martindell to waste no more time and storm the
position immediately. Again he refused. Instead, he ceased all fire for the
148
Journal of a Tour, p. 88.
156
night in order to make a road for yet another battery-this time for the sixpounders, in advance and to the left of Jampta, at a point which was only 200
yards from the remains of the stockade. In the morning he was quite
surprised to discover that the enemy had repaired their defences during the
lull in the bombardment. They had re-erected a breastwork at the back of the
demolished stockade, and dug a new trench behind that-thereby turning their
old rear into a new front. Ludlow had warned Martindell of the likelihood of
their doing precisely this, and was sick with exasperation to find his prediction
fulfilled. 'I have more and more reason to be disappointed at the faults and
blunders caused by insupportable procrastination . . . I suppose the General
will not allow another night to pass without molesting them. If he does there is
no saying what may be the consequence, for nothing is so dispiriting to
troops as to let a favourable moment pass by without taking advantage of it.'
But that night, 21 March, there was still no attack, much to the disgust
of the men, who wanted to repay the enemy in kind for the discomforts of
trench duty. The position at the advanced batteries were so exposed that,
with all their shot and shell, the British were unable to inflict more casualties
than they suffered.
The next afternoon, a few irregulars who had been sent to act as
sharpshooters took advantage of a slackening in the enemy fire to creep up
the glacis of the stockade almost to one of the flanking treches.
Spontaneously aided by a few sepoys who were at hand, they plunged in
among the enemy and soon seemed on the point of gaining the trench and
turning the position. James Baillie Fraser was convinced that they could even
have captured the stockade. But when their action was pointed out to the
Major-General, he was stockade by their rashness and immediately had them
called down.
Martindell's disastrous circumspection was less an expression of
personal timidity than a result of the counsel of officers of the 53 rd, who
persistently eschewed assault as too risky. Mawby was Martindell's
eminence grise: always at his elbow and completely domination his meek
and submissive personality. 'Unluckly', wrote Ludlow, whose own advice was
constantly ignored, there are advisers at our fountainhead who ruin
everything in the way of enterprise and who, I firmly think, expect the enemy
will surrender at discretion without our attacking them.' We have only to note
that Captain Chepmell, Mawby's Major of Brigade, described the eagerness
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of the sharpshooters as 'foolish' to confirm the identity of these advisers.
Prevented by influences of this nature form escaping the trammels of selfdoubt, humbled by successive bastinados such inaccessible country, the
unhappy Major-General lapsed into a state of complete mental deference to
the King's officers. Four days later, after three precious months and untold
quantities of stores and ammunition had been spent in preparation for the
exercise, he made the extraordinary decision that he would not, after all,
attempt to take Jaithak by assault. He suddenly decided that 'the hill on which
the fort [was] situated [was] not to be carried by assault if defended'. Weak
and tired, he surrendered at last to the pressures of more powerful
personalities. 'I did not deem it necessary', he told the Adjutant-General, 'to
call for the opinions of the senior engineer and artillery officers . . . especially
when I adverted to their periods of service compared with my own and those
of other officers under my command' (author's italics). The allusion speaks for
itself. He now announced that he had decided to reduce the fort by blockade,
and invoked Octherlony's example in a pathetic attempt to reconcile the
Governor-General to his change of plan. Hastings was incredulous, and at a
loss obvious from the start. Angrily, he accused the Major-General of having
squandered months of time and labour as well as huge quanities of valuable
stored and ammunition.
Martindell's first move in his new scheme of operations was to send
William Richards back to the right-hand ridge, whence he had been so
prematurely withdrawn on 27 December. With 1,100 sepoys, about 600
irregulars under Frederick Young and Krishna Singh, and two small mortars,
he left camp on the morning of 31 March. This time his operation was
completely successful. With a small advance guard and his own battalion, he
drove a Nepalese force 1,000 strong from Panjal peak, slightly south of
Peacock Hill. His casualties were only eight killed and fifty-one wounded, and
the whole operation was a clear vindication of the worth of the native troops,
even in mountain warfare, when properly handled.
It is indeed a success which ought to inspire you with a just confidence in the
officers and in the troops under your command [the Adjutant-General told
Martindell]. The Commander-in-Chief trusts you will have availed yourself of
the obvious advantage afforded to you by this defeat and discomfiture of so
large a part of the force opposed to you. The consequent division of the
remainder of it will have presented to you a most favourable opportunity for
restriction the enemy's movements and really establishing that close
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blockade on which your have placed your dependence for the reduction of
the fortress. His Excellency will await with considerable impatience the
accounts of your further proceeding, as your views must undoubtedly have
become more distinct and defined through the important success of that
division, on which you would not have calculated when you intimated the
outline of your plan.
His Excellency will also hope to hear that you have seen cause before
this to reduce the force you have hitherto kept in inactivity in Nahan. In the
position of the division of your command relatively to that of the enemy, His
Excellency conceives no apprehensions could be entertained for the security
of the town of Nahan were it left to the protection of a corps far short of that
which is now allotted to its defence.
Hastings should by now have known better than to expect so much of
Martindell. Having switched his attentions to the tactics of blockade,
Martindell pursed them with somnambulistic inflexibility and had absolutely no
heed for contingent advantages if they seemed to require tactics of assault.
The evening of 2 April was the ideal time for an attack on the stockades of
the left ridge, since it was known that the pick of the Nepalese troops had
been withdrawn to support the force attacked by Richards; but no move was
made-either then, or in the days and weeks succeeding. 'if the Genl. Would
take the stockades to the west, I could then close in on this side, and we
might do something', cried Richards. 'We must have patience, I see; but even
that is almost exhausted. I know mine is, although I believe I have a great a
stock as most people.' The Major-General ceased to react in any professional
sense to the events going on around him. He moved through each day in a
semi-comatose state, making a few motions of command, but in reality
avoiding all decisions and doing nothing more than mechanically forbidding
any measure which involved the slightest risk. John Ludlow made himself
very unpopular by repeatedly advocating more assertive measures, and
Martindell always tried to edge away when he went to make reports.
I went to him only two days ago [wrote Ludlow to his wife on 12 April] and told
him I observed 50 to 60 men with a chief descending from the most southern
stockade to interrupt some working parties of ours halfway between this and
Nahan, who came shooting up and destroying the company. I asked him if I
should detach a company or two from my post, which was nearest, to
endeavour to cut them off from the fort, which might easily have been done,
159
as the Gurkhas had got quite down into the nulla and were much nearer this
than the fort is. The old gentleman began to shy about, asking continually
where they were, and I as frequently pointed out several of them. He at last
told me there would be no use in sending after them, and he should direct
Kelly [in charge at Nahan] in future not to risk his working parties so near.
Fraser also reported the same evening that a party of 150 Gurkhas had gone
out to the north-west to forage and that they would not return until the
following night: but this was by him taken as little notice of as my report.
Major Ingleby of the 53rd I hear last night proposed to reconnoiter the
trenches of the stockade as he believed there were few men in them. The
General thanked him for his zeal, but would not risk valuable lives. I hope he
gets many of these hints, if only to convince him of the general sentiment
which prevails in this army. I confess my military ardour is beginning very
much to evaporate; and whose could not when matters are so ill-conducted?
If we do stay out the rains, which please God we may not yet, all of us so
doomed will have no one to thank for it but the man who commands us.
The army on Black Hill groaned under the tedium of an unbroken
routine to trench duty at the batteries interspersed by listless periods of relief
in camp. The guns continued a desultory cannonade against the stockade,
and by the end of the second week in April over 3,000 rounds of ammunition
of one kind or another had been expended. Reliable sources represented the
enemy force as 200 at the most in the nearest defences and 300 in the post
behind. These 500 were the only troops they had on the southern side of the
fort. Martindell had, with his irregulars, upwards of 9,000 men lying idle
before it. One day a Nepali deserter came into Ludlow's post at the batteries,
bringing with him as a propitiatory offering five British six-pound cannon balls.
He explained that Ranjor Singh Thapa now had an immense store of these.
The atmosphere in camp grew very strained. William Fraser, recalled from
Jubal by the resumption of operations against Jaithak, was no longer on
speaking terms with the Major-General and treated him with undisguised
contempt. On 4 April (false) reports were circulating that Bal Bahadur Singh
had been severely wounded in Richards's action, so Fraser sent a note to
Jaithak under a while flag, offering medical aid. Ludlow, who was then
commanding in the trenches, saw that the messenger, whom he thought sent
by the Major-General, had been received by the enemy and that they had
stopped firing. He therefore ordered the British guns to cease until the
exchange had been completed. Martindell, whom Fraser had not troubled to
160
consult or even inform of the measure he had taken, was surprised when the
batteries were suddenly silenced without his orders, and he asked for an
explanation. Yet such was the man's torpidity and so complete his loss of
self-respect, that he did not even complain at what was, after all, an
inexcusable impertinence on the part of the Political Agent. Only one section
of the officers professed to believe in some inscrutable wisdom behind the
commander's behavior, and that was the group which surrounded Mawby. 'If
we are to go by appearances we are not one step nearer taking the fort than
we were a month ago,' wrote Henry Sherwood to his wife at the end of April,
'but I believe the General knows what he is about.' The entry in his journal for
25 April reads thus: 'We are building small redoubts on the top of Black Hill
and Nauni as protection to our rear. The younger men laugh at the precaution
and give them ridiculous names; however, it is but prudent to be secure, for
the enemy may have 6,000 men while we have not 2,000 in any one [section
of the] army.'
Such an estimate of the enemy's force was demonstrably fatuous. Even
at its greatest extent the garrison of Jaithak could not have exceeded 2,000
fighting men, and how many of those could have been trained soldiers is a
matter for conjecture. After the beginning of April Ranjor's force was
furthermore dwindling all the time, because deserters came into the British
camp every day. Yet wildly exaggerated conceptions of the enemy's strength
continued to cripple enterprise not only before Jaithak, but in Dehra Dun as
well. On 1 April the Major-General received a dispatch from LieutenantColonel Carpenter, who complained that there were not enough troops in
Garhwal to garrison the four main captured fortresses (Kalsi, Birat, Chamur
and Jauntgarh) as well as to guard all the ghats on the Ganges and Baghirati
rivers. Lieutenant Menteith, commanding at Chamur, had reported that a
force of 600 Nepalese from Srinagar was prowling on the eastern bank of the
Baghirati, and had complained that it was quite impossible for his 250
irregulars to guard all the ghats over a thirty-mile stretch of river. Martindell
immediately wanted to send extra irregulars to Carpenter, and he requested
Fraser to increase the levy. For Fraser, this was the last straw. He diagnosed
the request as a symptom of the appalling credulity, ineptitude and lack of
imagination which had bedeviled the campaign from its inception. He took his
pen to reply to Martindell, and drove it at a furious pace. He poured scorn on
the absurd estimates of the enemy's strength current among British officers,
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who had allowed themselves to be duped by 'arrays of rusticks, ploughmen,
carriers, camp followers, women, boys and old men'.
Menteith's supposed 600 from Srinagar, he disdainfully demonstrated,
must be more like 215, or 300 at the most; and with indisputable cogency he
argued that had that officer but thought, or been allowed, to organize his
force as a single mobile unit instead of dispersing it into small fixed parties, it
could have moved swiftly to any place where the Nepalese threatened to
cross the river and supine tendency to attribute physical as well as numerical
superiority to the enemy.
On the point [of] . . . the physical and moral superiority the Gurkhas are said
to possess over our troops I shall say little, and I could wish that the general
impression in their favour was less prevalent. But supposing that it does
exist, is superiority in equipment, in discipline, in members to be quite
overlooked? Will no species of superiority be admitted in our favour? Will not
the boldness of the enemy increase in proportion as we fail in confidence,
enterprise and success, and their assurance and energy grow up as
diffidence and indecision mark the steps of our troops?
Hastings was entirely on Fraser's side, and considered his views 'just
and luminous'; but the nevertheless felt that, in deference to the declared
opinion of the commander of the division, the levy of irregulars should be
increased. Martindell wanted 7,000, but Fraser subsequently reported that it
was proving difficult to bring the levy, which stood at just over 6,000, to this
amount. To make good the deficiency, he wanted to arm and embody the
Nepali deserters, of whom there were now nearly 500 in camp, derived partly
from Jaithak and partly from Chaupal, a fort in Jubal which had been forced
to surrender. They had provided willing and invaluable instruction to the
engineers in the art of making stockades. 'I am of opinion that they will be
found trustworthy and faithful, and always a hardworking and serviceable
body' wrote Fraser, and so one of the British Gurkha regiments was born.
Soon after, Fraser and his brother quitted the camp and went to Jubal
again, taking another motley body of irregulars to reinforce those already
there. The main object of the expedition was to incite the inhabitants to attack
the various Nepali garrisons scattered between Jaithak and the scene of
Ochterlony's operations; but as it happened, the timely defection of the
Basahar Raja, which led to the defeat and dispersal of the enemy army of the
interior under Kirti Rana, made its services unnecessary. The Frasers were
162
nevertheless not disposed to return to camp. Leaving a part of their force to
occupy Chaupal, they embarked on a tour of the cis-Sutlaj Himalayan states
which was quite a voyage of discovery. James Baillie described the journey
in a book which earned him the admiration of Sir Walter Scott. His brother's
conduct in the campaign was later rewarded, at his own request, by the great
of the brevet rank of Major in the cavalry corps of his friend, James Skinner.
Meanwhile, Martindell made cautious and feeble efforts to straiten
Jaithak. On 12 April he sent Captain Wilson and a battalion of sepoys to
occupy a peak about a mile to the left of Black Hill and almost immediately
behind the fort. From here, a clear view was had of the rear of the nearest
stockade, which had been built into the back of the one destroyed.
They have erected strong sheds made of large timbers to keep them from the
shells [wrote Ludlow after a visit to Wilson's post] and have others lower
again, nigh the stockade, which look more like dog kennels than anything
else. In [the] rear of and about their trenches each man seems to have a hole
or cave, like bears' and wild beasts' to retire into from the effects of the shells.
Their number, however, is truly contemptible, and very few of them are real
Gurkhas.149 Indeed, the deserters say there that there are not more than 20
Gurkhas in the first stockade and trenches.
A few days later, Wilson moved round still farther and another force
was sent to occupy the hill he vacated, so that Jaithak was completely
surrounded. But by now Ranjor Singh had the measure of the man against
whom he was pitted and had little difficulty in breaking his blockade whenever
he wished. If he wanted to send out a party of forage for grain, he would
circulate a report through the British spies in his camp that he intended to
attack one of the British positions. Alarmed, Martindell would then
immediately put all his men under arms and order them to the defence of
their posts, thus leaving the Nepalese party free to roam abroad. The only
retort to this stratagem which he could devise was the destruction of all the
grain, now fully ripened, within a ten to fifteen mile radius of Jaithak-a cruel
and odious measure, which can hardly have helped to popularize the British
The men whom the British knew as 'real Gurkhas' are described by J.B.Fraser as having 'broad Chinese or
Tarter-like physiognomy . . . small eyes, flat nose, and meager whiskers . . . stout square make, and sturdy
limbs'-from which it is obvious that they were not Gurkhas at all, but Mongolian hillmen-Magars and
Gurungs. Real Gurkhas were similar in appearance to the native Khas of Sirmur, with whom Fraser
mistakenly contrasted them.
149
163
cause among the local farmers and peasants. It was clear from the large
number of deserters who came into the British camp each day after the last
weeks of April that the measures to starve the garrison were beginning to
have some effect; but at Headquarters they despaired of ever seeing the fort
completely succumb under the Major-General's palsied grip.150 He was sent
another reprimand, and with it a solemn warning:
It appears to the Commander-in-Chief that the posts you have established
are at much too great a distance from the place you mean to invest, as well
as too few in number; and that you do not detach parties sufficiently often to
endeavour to intercept the supplies which it must be obvious the enemy has
it in his power to receive from the country-particularly by night.
The very advanced state of the season; the glorious successes which
have attended the British arms under Major-General Ochterlony in Hindur
and under Colonel Nicolls in Kumaun, contrasted with the little apparent
advancement of public interests in your quarter render the state of our
operations before Jaithak highly detrimental to the interests of the state, a
source of continued anxiety to the Commander-in-Chief, and, His Excellency
fears, of discredit to our military character.
You spontaneously . . . took upon yourself the formidable responsibility
of abstaining from attack upon the positions which your instructions directed
you to attempt reducing. By that act you pledge [d] yourself to effect the
surrender of Jaithak through starving the garrison. You ought to be apprised
that should Ranjor Singh now come to a convention for the evacuation of the
fort and country (a measure not attributable to your operations but to our
conquest of Kumaun) a rigid enquiry will not the less be made into the
measures taken by you for the prosecution of that plan which you had
engaged should prove effectual; and were it to appear that those steps which
could alone make a blockade successful had been omitted, the
consequences would be very distressing.
Barely a week later, in a dispatch dated 17 May, came the dismissal
which was now too late to be a coup de grace. Octherlony's operations to the
On 12 April Ludlow wrote to his wife: 'You are right in supposing me no favorite at headquarters here,
tho' I have given on reason for displeasure, excepting, it might be, in a way which I thought it was my duty to
deliver my opinions and to recommend while I held the command on these heights some-what more activity.
In these suggestions I have entirely met the concurrence of the Hd. Qur. Folks, which to me is quite
sufficient.'
150
164
west being almost at an end, he was instructed to proceed, as soon as Amar
Singh Thapa capitulated, to assume the command at Nahan. Martindell was
informed that he might proceed to Saharanpur, Moradabad or Bareilly, as
best might suit himself, to await further instructions. He was in fact spared the
ignominy of actual supersession. Before the arrangement could become
operative, the war in Sirmur had come to an end. On 21 May, when violent
winds and hail announced the advent of the rainy season, Ranjor Sighg
Thapa, deserted by all his best soldiers and convinced, after receiving news
of the Gurkha collapse both to the west and to the east, of the futility of
further resistance, formally surrendered. The campaign had lasted slightly
more than five months.
Henry Sherwood went to examine the enemy defences, and was
'astonished at the weakness of the works'. He nevertheless added that the
natural strength of the position was 'very great . . . almost insurmountable'.
The Field-Engineer, Captain Carmichael Smyth, whose opinion regarding the
practicability of bombardment and assault Martindell had declined to seek,
had other views. After inspectiong the fort and the defences before it, he
gave it as his judgement that the very confined terreplain of the fort
'precluded the possibility of protracted defence after our guns were once
placed in a situation to bear upon the walls'. The only obstacles to their
gaining such a position had been the stockades on the left ridge, 'which had
they been attempted, must unquestionably have been in our possession in
the course of twelve hours'. In his view, therefore, 'no difficulty or obstacle
whatever existed to the possession of the whole of the enemy's position
which might not have been very readily and easily surmounted.' Such was
the conclusion dictated by technical data. In fact, the fort could never have
resisted at all. It was full of loose ammunition and gunpowder, and a single
shell would have blown it sky-high.
The subsequent fate of Gabriel Martindell forms a most eloquent
indictment of the military system of which he was a product. Despite his
demonstrable mental exhaustion and luck of self-confidence, he was neither
induced to retire nor even removed to the invalid establishment. On the
contrary, he continued to hold posts of high responsibility-the charge of a
column in the Pindari war in 1818 and the command of the First Division,
Bengal Field Army from 1820. He died in lieutenant-general, still on the active
list, in 1821, aged seventy-six. The inquiry into his conduct of the siege of
Jaithak which Hastings had threatened does not seem to have taken place.
165
The reason for this may lie in the fact that the Major-General was in 1815
included among those Company officers who were made Knight
Commanders of the Bath.151 Hastings was probably apprehensive lest
publicly disgracing Sir Gabriel should compromise the dignity of the Prince
Regent. Perhaps he realized too that the delinquency of a single senior
officer could only be, in the final analysis, but a symptom of fundamental
defects-defects which were sapping the whole military system of the East
India Company and which even he must despair of rectifying by superficial
measures of chastisement.
The misconduct of a King's officer, however, was a different matter, and
Sebright Mawby was not spared the deserts of his regiment's malefaction.
The 53rd left Nahan early in June and proceeded to Fort William in Calcutta,
where it was joined by some officers from its second battalion. The new
arrivals, who had been on service in Spain, jeered their comrades for their
failure to take the paltry hill fort of Kalanga, mocking and deriding 'Indian'
troops and old soldiers. The atmosphere of the mess became highly charged.
There were violent arguments, and two duels even took place. Untold
damage was done merely by the prospect of the court of inquiry, even though
such courts did not conduct any form of trial. Their object was merely to
gather the information necessary to determine whether prosecution under the
terms of military law was justified or not in a particular case. They passed no
judgement and did not give an opinion unless expressly ordered to.
The one appointed to examine the circumstances of the failures before
Kalanga remains, also, almost wholly mysterious. The meager scraps of
information concerning it which have so far come to light indicate that the
court initially convened in January 1815, but was then adjourned on some
point of legal procedure. I assembled again at Meerut, the following year,
under the presidency of Jasper Nicolls, the Quartermaster of the King's
Troops in India. The indications are that Hastings had had second thoughts
concerning its expediency in the meantime. In October 1815, Sherwood had
noted in his journal that 'Lord Hastings [was] aware now of his injustice, and
appear [ed] to wish to forget it', and his contention is supported by the fact
that the Governor-General had become especially anxious that the court
The Order of the Bath, hitherto consisting of one class only, was now divided into Grand Crosses, Knight
Commanders and Companions. Several Company officers, including Ludlow, were made Companions in
1815.
151
166
should be held in secret. When Mawby agreed to secrecy, Hastings was very
relieved.
The court, which began its sittings on 24 January 1816, was therefore
closed form the outset. A search among the records in London and in Delhi
had failed to uncover its proceedings, and its opinion, which was asked for, is
not known. The court's minutes must have been voluminous, for, according to
Chepmell, it was not until July that Hastings received them and 'determined
to read them throughtout', and with them is undoubtedly lost much valuable
information concerning the strange history of Gillespie's last hours and the
third failure to take Kalanga. All that is now known about the court is
contained in the few sparse jotting made by Captain Chepmell in his diary.
From these it appears that the inquiry began unfavourably for the Colonel
and the regiment, but that there was a general sense of relief when Nicholls
was replaced as President by Lieutenant-Colonel Need, another King's
officer, in February. 'I fell glad of that circumstance, as I consider Nicolls a
prejudiced man.' But it is possible to make a reasonably confident conjecture
concerning the nature of the court's findings. It is known that Mawby did not
suffer as a result of the inquisition. There is no record of a court martial, he
was promoted Major-General in 1819 and he died a Lieutenant-General in
1851. It is therefore almost certain that the court exculpated him. Did it do
more? Did it uncover unpleasant truths concerning Gillespie's mental state
and conduct? Or had Hastings in that year's interval uncovered such truths
himself, which made him regret his rash promise to scrutinize the behavior of
Mawby and the 53rd and anxious that the whole business should be brought
to a conclusion as quietly and inconspicuously as possible? It is an
interesting and possibly relevant fact that from about October 1815 Hasting's
attitude towards Stamford Raffles began to change. In that month he
recorded his official minute recognizing that Gillespie had been totally
unjustified in traducing Raffles's moral character; and later his manner
towards Gillespie's old adversary became almost gracious.
167
THE TRIUMPH OF OCHTERLONY
HE more westerly of the two 'divisions' formed to act in the western theatre
of the war was commanded by Major-General David Ochterlony. Acting on
Twhat was the remotest periphery not only of the East India Company's
possessions, but also of known southern Asia, its purpose was to attack the
Gurkha field army under Amar Singh Thapa. This lay in the hill station of Arki,
deep wihin the fastnesses of the freshly conquered Gurkha colonies between
the Jumna and the Sutlaj. Hasting determined that the army must be
destroyed, dispersed or compelled to surrender before it could move
eastwards to assist the defenders of Kathmandu. Assuming that his tactics
would be those of pursuit rather than of siege, the Governor-General did not
anticipate that Ochterlony would need heavy ordnance; but his own discretion
was to be the Major-General's guide in this matter.
Ochterlony's record was impressive. He had fought as a subaltern
under Coote, in the Carnatic, where he had been captured and deprived of
an eye. As a major, he had commanded a battalion under Lake in the
Maratha campaign of 1803 and, after the capture of Delhi, had been
appointed British Resident at the Mogul court. His defence of the city against
Holkar had been brilliant and had checked the Maratha in the full swell of his
jubilance after the discomfiture of Monson. But Ochterlony's military talent
and instinctive flair for leadership wee combined with a proneness to
pessimism and an easily aroused sense of grievance. His removal from the
Residency at Delhi by a Gorvernor-General who wished to make room for a
more senior civilian had left a permanent strain of bitterness in his character
and heightened his sensitivity to adverse criticism. His appointment at
Ludhiana, where he was Agent for relations with the protect Sikh states,
dated from 1808. It had signaled fresh recognition of his talents and given
him fresh interests; but he remained temperamental and difficult to deal with.
In moods of enthusiasm he would show eagerness, independence and even
arrogance; while in his melancholy or sense of discouragement he would
descent on his own foreboding and make a parade of his despair.
Despite his previous keenness to march into the hills and chastise
Amar Singh Thap, he regarded the Governor-General's plan for a full-scale
war against the Gurkhas with apathy and misgiving. He decided that the
restoration of the hill chiefs (which he had himself previously advocated) was
not a good idea after all, and he wrote at length to the government to
'deprecate the extension of an expensive and harassing protection to
ingrates who, if relieved from their present oppressors, or restored to their
ancient possessions will, by their own petty internal disputes in all probability
furnish an endless source for their deliverance'. It was now his view that it
would be much wiser to abandon the policy of restitution. 'If we do attack, it
168
should be avowedly in the first instance to conquer for ourselves.'152 He no
longer had hopes of assistance from the exiled hill chiefs- 'men who now
literally subsist on charity'-and he began to disown his own earlier
assessment of the enemy. There was no more mention of 'ill disciplined
barbarians'; instead, he became cautionary and even grudgingly appreciative
of the Gurkhas' qualities.
This change of attitude is not difficult to explain. Ochterlony disliked
Hastings, for a start, and had been depressed by the departure of his old
friend, Lord Minto. 'I don not like this new viceroy', he wrote confidentially to
Metcalfe, the Delhi Resident, in January 1814. 'All noise and emptiness, like
a drum . . . I believe the old one was worth a dozen such.' Secondly, he was
disappointed for personal reasons with Hastings's arrangements for the
invasion. He was fifty-six, and had been waiting for thirty-five years for an
important independent command; and now, when a project he had made his
own and which he was better qualified than any officer in India to conduct
was at last put into operation, he found that he was assigned a subordinate
role, as second-in-command to Gillespie, a King's officer nearly ten years his
junior. His sourness is not to be wondered at. It typified the state of mind
induced in many officers by the frustrations and humiliations of service with
the Company.
There was no apparent reason why the Governor-General should have
any special regard for Ochterlony. His promising youth was long past, and he
had had no dazzling career in Java to renew his reputation. He was not on
the Bengal general staff, and had for five years been absent from the main
sources of influence and patronage, exercising a rather obscure political
function at the very extremity of the Bengal Presidency. Hastings therefore
felt no qualms about giving him a modest role. He was merely to occupy
Amar Singh Thapa for a few weeks, until the second western division could
join him. He was then to surrender his command to Gillespie. His army
contained no European troops and, as Hastings for some reason reckoned
that the scene of his operations presented 'comparatively fewer difficulties'
than territory further east, he decided not to furnish him with 'the same
description and extensive scale of equipment'. This seems to have meant
that Ochterlony's men had to do without even warm clothing, because the
records seems to contain no mention of their having been issued with
pantaloons and waistcoats.
Ochterlony consequently had to pin all his hopes on the unaided merits
of his sepoys and to rely on whatever extraordinary resources he could
152
Ludhiana Records, pp. 392-3. See also Kaye, life of Metacalfe, i, p. 389, fn.
169
improvise himself. His force consisted of four and a half battalions of native
infantry, two troops of native cavalry, two companies of pioneers and a
company of foot artillery-making a total of between 5,500 and 6,000 men,
including gun lascars and ordnance drivers, of whom only the commissioned
officers and sixty-two artillerists were Europeans. He had in addition some
auxiliaries provided by Ram Saran, the exiled Raja of Hindur (in whose old
hill territories he was to operate) and by the lowland Sikh rajas under the
Company's protection, among whom the Raja of Patiala was the most
unstinting contributor. These amounted to about 4,000 men. His aggregate
force therefore outnumbered that of his adversary, the total of whose army he
estimated as 7,000 men, but which in fact was probably more like 5,000. The
Sikhs were most impressive. With their tall athletic physiques, long glossy
beards, multicoloured turbans, broad scimitars and proverbial matchlocks,
they looked ready to eat the Devil. But it was doubtful that they would prove
reliable in mountain warfare. Their additional mode of combat was as free
cavaliers, and they had no experience of fighting as disciplined infantry.
In addition to the troops, there were about 3,000 public servants and
6,000 camp followers, so the concourse which assembled at the town of
Rupar, on the eastern bank of the Sutlaj below the foothills, finally comprised
something in the region of 18,000 people. The number of servants was so
relatively small because the lowlanders half dreaded and half revered the
hills as the abode of the gods. They would not volunteer for services as
coolies, and those impressed continually deserted. Anxious to avoid initial
delays, Ochterlony made up his mind to use bullocks for transportation at the
outset of his campaign, and his commissariat department collected 5,000 of
these. He counted on being able to recruit porters, who would be essential in
the difficult country of the interior, after he had entered the hills.
Perspicaciously, he made up his mind to take heavy guns. Hastings,
assuming that Amar Singh Thapa's first concern would be to rush his force to
the defence of Kathmandu, had inferred that Ochterlony's operations would
take the form of pursuit and interception; but Ochterlony himself was
becoming increasingly convinced that his tasks would in fact be siege and
dislodgement. 'It may be concluded', he wrote as early as August 1814, 'that
either at the entrance of the Nalagarh pass, or in some chosen strong
position on the way to Arki, [Amar Singh Thapa] will make his first defensive
art of stockade etc., which they have in use.' Making use of the latitude which
the Governor-General had accorded him, he therefore decided to equip
himself not (as had been recommended) for the pursuit of a mobile enemy,
but for confrontation with a stationary one who would have to be expelled
from hilly fortresses by shot and shell. Two eighteen-pounders, ten sixpounders, two heave howitzers and two heavy mortars were summoned from
the magazines at Karnal and Agra.
170
The army left Rupar shortly before the end of October. Its march lay
north-eastwards. The mountains of Hindur stretched across its path in
successive massive ridges, heaving progressively higher towards the farthest
ranges of peaks, which glistened like freshly broken alabaster. Each ridge
was buttressed by hefty spurs, which trust at irregular intervals and
haphazard angles into the interjacent valleys. Well within this immense and
multiple barricade lurked the old Gurkha general: resolute, defiant and at
guarded; and his communications with his client state of Bilaspur, lying
across the Sutlaj to the north-west, well secured. Its puppet Raja, Maha
Chand, acting under the vigilant eye of Shiva Dat Rai, the Kaji's personal
agent, had so far proved a complaisant ally. He was keeping the Gurkha
army well supplied and had obediently complied with Amar Singh's request
for 1,000 soldiers. Ochterlony arrived at Palasi, the lowland capital of the
Hindur Raja, on 31 October, and halted a day to pay the troops and jettison
superfluous baggage. On 2 November he resumed his march, striking due
east along the route to Arki, through thickly tufted forest. Occasional glimpses
could be had of the first range of hills and, on a high forward-jutting bluff
before it, the fort of Nalagarh.
This was known as the key to Hindur. It was of irregular shape,
matching the contours of the ground, and seemed like an excrescence of the
rock itself. Its bastions and walls were high, with parapets, and punctured all
over with loopholes; but it did not, on inspection, give an impression of great
strength. The approaches, however, presented formidable difficulties. The
only access was by a steep, narrow pathway, which was intercepted by
numerous watercourses. These were now dry, but littered with boulders and
obstructed by rocky projections. The whole ground was covered with a
matted jungle of spiky bamboos. It was impossible to pitch camp any nearer
than three miles from the fort, but Lieutenant Peter Lawtie, the FieldEngineer, immediately took a small party, by a widely circuitous route, to
reconnoiter the adjacent heights. He found a site suitable for a battery near
the ruins of the abandoned town of Nalagarh and only 225 yards from the
walls of the fort, and this position was occupied the same night (2 November)
by seven companies of sepoys under Lieutenant-Colonel Thompson. The
Nepalese in the fort kept up a brisk fire from muskets and jinjals while the
detachment prepared the ground, wounding a few men and killing a sergeant
of pioneers. The following morning, while the battery was being constructed,
the two eighteen-pounders and six-pounders wee moved from the camp by
fatigue parties of sepoys. There had been no time to make a proper road,
and it would have been impossible to drag up the heavy guns had it not been
for the elephants. Ochterlony had been warned by native informants that the
mountain paths were impassable for all four-footed animals save the hill
pony; but when he heard that an elephant had once been sent as a present
171
from Nahan, in Garhwal, to Basahar, he had reasoned that these beasts
must be capable of manoeuvring the ground it carefully handled. The
performance of the elephants in this occasion amply vindicated his
judgement. The eighteen-pounde barrels, made of iron and each weighing
over a ton, were too heavy to be carried on the backs of even these powerful
animals; but wherever there was room two elephants followed each mounted
gun and, at a command from the mahouts perched on their necks, bent their
foreheads to the backs of the carriages and thrust the machines bodily up the
slope, while the men at the drag ropes guided them along. When a wheel
lodged in a rut or cavity, an elephant would either mould his trunk to the outer
rim or entwine it around spoke and lift the whole engine free with an
impressive combination of finesse and strength. They showed little hesitation
so long as low overhanging branches were cut away. The ordnance pieces
were at the summit by dusk and in battery by eight o'clock the next morning,
4 November.
The hills reverberated and birds soared up as they opened fire. At first,
the six-pounders wrought great havoc. The Nepalese had a few stones on
their ramparts, ready to assail a storming party, and few well-aimed balls sent
the whole lot showering into the fort, lethal as grapeshot. But the walls
themselves proved more resistant than had been expected. Although the
eighteen-pounders were at reasonably close range, it took them twenty-four
hours to hammer down sufficient fabric to make a breach. At about nine
o'clock on the morning of the 5th, when preparations were at last being made
for an assault, two brahmins appeared in the breach to parley. After some
negotiation, the garrison surrendered as prisoners of war and relinquished
their arms. A small outpost to the north-west capitulated at the same time,
bringing the total of prisoners to ninety-five. These were sent to Ludhiana,
escorted by one of the troops of native cavalry. So the first of Amar Singh's
fortresses fell to Ochterlony-at the cost of much labour and patience, but with
few casualties. Apart from the sergeant of pioneers, none of the British force
was killed and only about half a dozen wounded.
The road of Arki meandered over the shoulder of the Nalagarh spur to
a village called Goela, where it crested the first ridge of hills. From Goela, the
road plunged 1,000 feet into the valley of a small river, and then climbed up
the western flank of the second hilly range. This second ridge maintained a
general altitude of between 4,000 and 5,000 feet above sea level, save
opposite Goela, where there was a wide gash, 800 feet deep. Through this,
like a very fine strand lost in the eye of a huge needle, threaded the Arki
road. Guarding the gorge from its northern side, sprawling astride the crest of
the ridge, was the fort of Ramgarh.
172
On the night of 4 November, Ochterlony had heard that the main body
of Amar Singh Thapa's army had left Arki and its subsidiary post of Subathu
and advanced to Ramgarh. Anxious to forestall any fresh advance,
Ochterlony directed his reserve, commanded by Thompson, to move on
immediately to secure the road in advance of Nalagarh. By the morning of 5
November Thompson had reached Bariyan, en route for Goela, without
having encountered the enemy. Meanwhile Ochterlony lightened his column
as much as the possible, in preparation for his own advance. His heavy
ordnance, however, he kept, persuaded that his forecast concerning the
nature of the impending warfare had been confirmed. 'It would seem that the
character and operations of the war should be changed', he told the AdjutantGeneral, 'and instead of being composed of small detachments with light
artillery, our force should be concentrated on certain points; and however
tardy their progress . . . [none] should move without a gun or guns sufficient
to throw open these barriers . . . It is not my intention to relinquish the
battering guns if any strength, labour or exertion can get them forward.' He
resigned himself to a slow but sure advance. 'Manual labour, strength and
preseverance seem our principal dependencies in these alpine regions. Our
progress will be slow, but I trust it will be certain; and I hope His Excellency
will approve a determination I have formed not to be hurried into any attempt
that will occasion more eventual delay that the very tedious advance I now
anticipate.'
Hastings had many faults as a Commander-in-Chief, but he was neither
meddlesome nor dictatorial. Not being on the scene of action himself, he did
not presume to question the decision of deputies who were, provided always
that those decisions were cogently argued and genuinely influenced by local
circumstances. Privately, he was dismayed by the loss of speed which
Ochterlony's proposals would entail; but having allowed the commander to
use his own discretion and devise his own tactics, he did not now hesitate to
honour the spirit of the permission. Publicly, he fully endorsed Ochterlony's
argument.
So the pioneers set to work to prepare the road for two eighteenpounders, four six-pounders and a couple each of heavy howitzers and
mortars. They were diligently assisted by artisans and labourers supplied by
the Raja of Hindur. Trees had to be felled and rocks blasted to clear the way.
Labyrinthine pathways had to be widened, borders scarped, pot-holes filled,
declivities banked and parapets raised to prevent the heavy engines from
toppling over the brinks of precipicies. The ordnance was got forward to
Thompson's position at Bariyan by 10 November, and Octherlony then
prepared to follow with the line. Thompson again moved ahead of the main
force and arrived at Goela at sunset on the 11th-which was none too early,
because he disturbed a party of Nepalese who had already begun to
173
stockade the position. He was now on the crest of the first ridge of hills. From
Goela he could look across the valley to Ramgarh fort on the second ridge.
Here lay Amar Singh Thapa, with the flower of his army-nearly 3,000 men,
besides his Bilaspur auxiliaries. His dexterous soldiers had already been
busy, stockading the spurs below and the heights adjacent to the fort, so that
his position now straddled the gorge through the passage from the north;
while just over a mile south of it a peak called Kot, which was 200 feet higher
again than Ramgarh, had also been occupied and fortified. Between these
two posts were five stockades: four on the crest of the ridge, and one in the
gorge astride the Arki road itself.
The Major-General arrived at Goela with the rest of the army on 12
November. It needed only a glance through his telescope to convince
Octherlony that the Gurkha's position was unassailable from the front and
north; but it did seem that Kot stockade could be attacked by a force moving
up the crest of the ridge form the south. The next day, therefore, he
augmented the reserve and sent it across the valley and up the flank of the
ridge to a settlement called Kahanani. This ws on the crest of the ridge about
two miles south to Kot, and was situated on ground broad enough to give
sufficient camping space.
Thompson arrived there without mishap, and Field-Engineer Lawtie,
who had accompanied the reserve, then embarked on an intricate inspection
of the vicinity of the Gurkha position. Every night for a week he roamed into
the rugged and uncharted crevices of the Ramgarh ridge, producing
invaluable maps and sketches of country hitherto untrodden by Europeans.
The front and southern flanks of Amar Singh Thapa's position he confirmed
were inaccessible; but in the valley to the Gurkha's rear, on the other side of
the ridge, he discovered the settlement called Nori. This was on an extensive
plain, and Lawtie reckoned that an attack could be launched against
Ramgarh from here. Octherlony readily accepted his assessment, and
resolved that the fort must be assaulted from behind.
Peter Lawtie was only twenty-four, and youth was no recommendation
in an officer cadre where rank was determined by seniority. But Lawtie was a
brilliant engineer, modest and charming, while Octherlony was never one to
suffer his feelings to be dictated to. He took to Lawtie at once, made him an
A.D.C., and was happy to rely on both his professional skill and his
friendship.
When he transferred his base to Nori, Octherlony would, of course,
considerably extend his line of communication and supply; but he did not
reckon that this need increase significantly its vulnerability. He had already
learnt, from studying the Nepalese' war, and he shrewdly calculated that the
174
enemy would hesitate to attack his detachments if these were defended after
their own manner. Inevitably, more detachments would entail a dispersal of
his army and reduce the number of men he could bring against Ramgarh;
eastern side of the ridge would sufficiently compensate for this decrease by
enabling him to bring his artillery into play. Even failing this, there would
always be the advantage in the move that it would place the British army
between Amar Singh Thapa and Arki, his main base, and thereby enable it to
harass the enemy supply lines.
As a ruse designed to mask his main manoeuvre, he decided that, for
the time being, he would leave his two eighteen-pounders and a couple of
pieces of light artillery in the valley below the western approaches to
Ramgarh, under the charge of a battalion of native infantry. A convenient
position once established on the heights by an assault from the east, these
could then either be brought through the Ramgarh gorge or taken up the
western flank of the ridge and over the crest.
The most daunting obstacle to the main movement was the appalling
difficulty of the road. It was as well that Octherlony had prepared his men for
the expenditure of 'manual labour, strength and perseverance', because the
campaign could never have proceeded had the army given these qualities
grudgingly. The pioneers had already been busy clearing the descent from
Goela, and all the artillery was moved down to the valley by the evening of 7
November; but the route from there over the hump of the ridge into the valley
beyond was still impassable for carriage cattle. Determined to economize
every hour at his disposal, Octherlony had each of the field-guns selected to
accompany the principal force taken from its carriage and lashed to the back
of an elephant. 7,000 coolies were put to work to drag the empty carriages
and carry the ammunition. In this fashion the force and its ordnance were got
as far as Thompson’s position at Kahanani, on the crest, by nightfall on 19
November; and simultaneously the battering train, with a battalion of sepoys
under Lieutenant-Colonel Adams, had made its way north up the valley to a
site below the western face of Ramgarh. All the baggage and the bazaars
were left temporarily at Goela, under the protection of a party of Patiala
Sikhs, until the road to Kalianani had been made practicable. Fortunately, as
the army had moved into the interior, certain of his old zemindars had joined
the Hindur Raja, and these were now bribed to set their people working on
the road. They worked hard, and by the evening of the zoth the stores and
baggage had begun to arrive at Kahanani. The position here was meanwhile
defended by an elaborate Gurkha-style stockade. But before the army could
descend the eastern flank of the ridge and move to its new ground at Nori,
this part of the route had also to be cleared. It was not until the 23 rd that the
movement was resumed, and not until the 24th that camp was finally pitched
in the valley at the rear of Ramgarh.
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The new position of the British army was a level plateau in the beautiful
valley of the Gambar river, about one and a half miles north of and some 5oo
feet below the gorge of the Ramgarh pass. The valley was well watered, and
richly wooded with shrubs and wild fruit trees. As soon as he had understood
Ochterlony’s intentions, Amar Singh Thapa had set his men to defend the
eastern approach to his position, so the spurs jutting into the Gambar valley
were already pimpled with stockades and stone redoubts. Ochterlony had a
battery for his field-guns constructed in front of the foremost enemy stockade
by 26 November, and early that morning an attempt was made to bombard
the structure. It soon became apparent that the guns were too far from and
below their target. At about half-past nine, the Major-General asked Lawtie to
reconnoitre the ground farther forward. The Field Engineer left the battery
about an hour later, accompanied by 100 sepoys. The detachment
proceeded towards a hill which had been designated as a possible site for a
new battery. It had to pass through a small gully, and before this had been
cleared enemy marksman opened fire from the heights on both sides. Lawtie
thought quickly. The hill was not far ahead and, although it was crowned by
an occupied breastwork, he judged that a rapid advance to assault it involve
no greater hazard than a retreat through the gully; while if the hill was gained,
it would be a good position in which to reinforcement. He therefore divided
his force and sent fifty men forward immediately to the attack. Ensign Symes
led them hill to the breastwork, which they easily captured. They war charge
the stockade, which was about 300 yards behind, and took cover under the
breastwork only after repeated urging from their officer. Meanwhile Lawtie
came up with the remainder of the force, which he deployed to the right and
the left of the position to ward off the snipers still on its flanks. After about ten
minutes a crowd of Nepalis emerged from the stockade with drums, trumpets
and colours, and bore down on the small party at the breastwork.
When Ochterlony heard the sound of firing, he immediately ordered
forward a reinforcement under Lieutenant Williama; but, because of a cruel
contretemps, its assistance came too late. Before the main body of the
reinforcement could reach them, Lawtie's men were without ammunition and
already in retreat. Cartridges were supplied in wooden boxes, which were like
cigar cases joined end to end at their bases and designed to fit into the
sepoys’ leather ammunition pouches. The cartridges were pulled lengthwise
from their tubular cavities by small tags. When all the cartridges in the one
section of the box had been used, it had to be lifted from the pouch, reversed
and re-inserted so that those in the lower tier were uppermost. But on this
occasion the sepoys at the breastwork found that when their upper rows of
cartridges had been expended it was impossible to lift the boxes from the
pouches and get at those below. Variations in the climate had shrunk the
leather or swollen the wood or both. Fingers tugged and tore in vain.
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Emboldened by the slackening of their fire, the Nepalis came on faster. Even
so, it was only when the accessible supply of cartridges had failed altogether
and when the enemy were hardly twenty paces away that the party withdrew.
With fire coming from both flanks and the rear, to which there was no means
of replying, the retreat threatened to become a rout, and only the timely
arrival of the bulk of the reinforcing party enabled Lawtie’s men to complete it
in reasonably good order. Williams lost his life while supervising the covering
operation in the defile. Forty-one sepoys also were killed, and thirty-three
injured.
Lawtie was full of praise for the courage of his men, and insisted that
any blame for the reverse must attach to his own misjudgement. But
Ochterlony reproached only himself, for having entrusted the operation to a
weak reconnaissance party instead of making it a regular and concerted
attack.
The repulse, although minor, had grave implications. It made it seem
that the move to Nori had been unprofitable after all. While certain
advantages of ground had indeed resulted from it, the detachments from
Ochterlony’s main force which it had demanded had none the less made it
impossible for these advantages to be exploited. Furthermore, as the weeks
slipped by it became increasingly apparent that the manoeuvre would
produce only slow and uncertain effect by way of straitening Ramgarh. Amar
Singh was now beleaguered on three sides, it is true; but his communications
with the north were still secure and he continued to draw supplies from Maha
Chand and Shiva Dat Rai in Bilaspur. Ochterlony had hoped that Raja
Sansar Chand of Kotoch, the Gurkha’s erstwhile rival contender for Kangra
fort, would attack Bilaspur from west of the Sutlaj, and his failure to do so was
the cause of fresh disappointment. Sansar Chand’s military commander was,
it will be recalled, an Irish deserter from the 8th Dragoons, calling himself
O’Brien, who had professed to be willing to use his influence to help the
British. At the beginning of November he had written to Ochterlony to assure
him that Sansar Chand had placed all his troops in readiness to enter the
war, whereupon Ochterlony had requested him to attack Bilaspur. But instead
of allowing his army to march, Sansar Chand had sent his excuses, affirming
that he dare not move it for fear lest Ranjit Singh (to whom lie now professed
allegiance) should attack his territories in its absence. Convinced that the
Raja was merely prevaricating, Ochterlony had sent a letter to Ranjit Singh
making it perfectly clear that his suzerainty over Kotoch was not questioned,
and renewed his efforts to persuade O’Brien to co-operate. He had extended
to him the promise of a free pardon, and the prospect of even further reward.
But Ochterlony’s letter found O’Brien flat on his back in an alcoholic stupor,
and when he was sufficiently sober to raise the matter again with the Raja,
the latter was enraged by this unauthorized correspondence with the British.
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The quarrel between the two men became very violent, and at the end of
December O’Brien offered to desert with 1,500 men and eight pieces of
ordnance in return for a free pardon for himself and ‘a Nother European’,
called Charles Macdonald. But then a month went by without further news,
and in the meantime a dispatch from headquarters instructed Ochterlony to
use O’Brien as a free agent only as a last resort. Even then, while he was left
free to resume attempts to influence the ltaja through O’Brien, it was stressed
that the Raja’s co-operation would not be worth the ill will of Ranjit Singh.
Thus discouraged on the one hand by hedging and hesitation in Kotoch, and
inhibited on the other by doubts and second thoughts at Headquarters,
Ochterlony finally concluded that it would be idle to hope for assistance from
Sansar Chand’s army, and resigned himself to fighting the war alone.
This was not the only source of disheartenment. Ochterlony was finding
himself increasingly hamstrung by his lack of information. He knew almost
nothing of the country in which he was operating, and local guides had
absolutely no notion of accurate information. ‘they reckoned distances, for
example, in terms of the ‘coss’, which could mean anything between threequarters of a mile and two miles; and they were incapable of descriptions of
terrain which had any meaning in military terms. He was therefore entirely
without the means of knowing what natural strategic advantages his position
afforded. The exact location of Arki was unknown, and the number of forts
and the nature of the routes between that place and Ramgarh only guessed
at. He was circumscribed by uncharted territory and could not plan beyond
the range of his telescope— which was not very far in country composed of
mountains and glens, of which twice as much was always concealed as was
surveyed from any single vantage-point. Then again, the proclamation
inviting the co-operation of the hill chiefs and their people had produced only
a very limited response, and not enough porters could be found for even the
most essential purposes. Finally, there was the deeply disturbing knowledge
that three attempts to take the contemptible hill fort of Kalanga had failed.
News of the last repulse arrived on 2 December, just as Ochterlony was
contemplating another attempt to gain an advanced position for his fieldbattery, and the information made him throw up the idea in despair.
During December the campaign remained in a state of impasse. It now
seemed most unlikely that the projected joining of forces with the other
western division would ever take place; but in his pessimism Ochterlony
claimed that even with reinforcements he would be unable to do more than
embark on the long and wearisome expedient of starving the Nepalis into
submission. Despondency pervaded the British camp in these dull (lank days
about the winter solstice, when the mountains were half-dissolved in mist and
human breath hung visible in the air. The sepoys began to fall ill, and by the
middle of the month almost 6oo out of 4,600 infantry were returned as sick.
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The nights were frosty, and many of the invalids were probably suffering from
the effects of the cold, against which they can have had little protection if, as
seems likely, they had not been supplied with warm clothing. But primitive
sanitation must also have played its part in causing the general debility.
When in the field, Indian armies, like medieval royal households, were
compelled to keep moving in order to escape the diseases engendered by
their own garbage; and now that the troops and all the attendants and
followers of the army had been using them for a month, the various camp
sites around Ram-garb must have been like open latrines. Seeing the
sickness and dejection of his men, Octhterlony was oppressed by qualms
and dark presentiment. He began to think that the Bengal sepoys were
physically incapable of withstanding the duresses of mountain warfare, and
he doubted that success was even possible.
A reinforcement of a battalion of sepoys (the 2nd/7th, ‘one of the finest in
the service and nearly complete’) had been promised Ochterlony soon after
the outset of the war, and would have reached him early in the campaign had
its progress from Lucknow not been delayed by civil disturbances in
Moradabad. It was not until the third week in December that the corps,
commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Lyons, finally arrived below Ramgarh.
Here it relieved Adams of the eighteen-pounders and escorted them over the
ridge, arriving in the main camp at Non on 27 December. At about the same
time two field-howitzers and four light mortars, all with collapsible carriages of
the type which Hastings had personally designed, arrived from Cawnpore.
Ochterlony’s effective regular infantry force now stood at about 5,000,
of whom just over 3,000 were in the main camp at Nori, and he felt strong
enough to try to close the northern gap in his encirclement of Amar Singh
Thapa’s position.
On the crest of the ridge, about four miles north of Ramgarh, was a fort
called Mangu, possession of which would, Ochterlony reckoned, serve his
purpose well. It was approached by a two-mile-long spur, which jutted from
the ridge into the Gambar valley and which was defended by a stone redoubt
called Tibu at its eastern end. Soon after dusk on 27 December, Thompson
left Nori with fourteen companies of sepoys, 1,000 auxiliaries, two sixpounders and two howitzers to occupy this spur and attack Mangu.
The night was fine, and the distance not great; but the ground was so
broken and inhospitable that it was eight o’clock the next morning before
Thompson began to climb the flank of the spur. He reached the crest with his
advance about 700 yards in front of Tibu, and was at once assailed by
musket fire from a party of the enemy which had emerged from the redoubt
and advanced to a position near the end of the spur. He immediately ordered
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his advance guard to turn left and repel this party, which they did, driving the
Nepalis back along the crest of the spur and into the redoubt. The post itself,
he decided, was too strong to attack without artillery, so he waited for the
gun-bearing elephants to arrive before resuming operations. At about four in
the afternoon the two six-pounders opened fire at 500 yards, but made little
impression. Thompson decided that the battery must be pushed nearer, and
he asked the pioneers to make extra fascines and gabions.
By now, however, Amar Singh Thapa had fathomed Ochterlony’s
intentions, and he determined to bring every man he could spare into an
effort to dislodge Thompson. During the night he withdrew all his troops from
the stockades south of Ramgarh and moved them into fresh positions on the
crest of the ridge to the north. He transferred his own headquarters to Mangu.
About a quarter of an hour before sunrise on 29 December, the largest force
of Nepalis so far seen, estimated at between 2,000 and 25,00 men, streamed
out of Mangu and came in full career towards the peak on which the British
camp was perched, at the eastern extremity of the spur.
There followed a ferocious and confused engagement, which lasted for
nearly three hours. The enemy, sword in hand, attacked Thompson’s position
with reckless disregard for the impracticability of its approaches. It seems,
indeed, that it was to the general inaccessibility of their ground and the
command it gave them over the various assailing detachments, that
Thompson’s party owed their deliverance. The mere sight of the khuhuris
again made the sepoys pusillanimous, and they refused to parry them with
bayonets. Several fled in terror, and were ripped to shreds by the flashing
enemy knives. But because almost all the directions of their assault could be
enfiladed by musketry, few Nepalis actually reached the camp and great
numbers were killed and wounded in the attempt. The main party grimly
persisted in their effort to scale an escarpment raked by fire from above, but
were finally forced to retreat bearing many wounded and leaving sixty dead. It
was estimated that the total of their casualties must have reached 250
wounded and 15o killed. Thompson had nine men killed and forty-four
wounded.
As soon as it got dark the Nepalis in the intermediate redoubt at Tibu
abandoned their posts and retired to Mangu. It was immediately occupied by
Thompson’s light infantry pickets, who discovered that it had been so deeply
excavated as to be virtually impregnable by artillery.
Amar Singh Thapa had suffered a repulse, but he had nevertheless
successfully forestalled Ochterlony’s attempt to turn his northern flank. By
abandoning his posts to the south of Ramgarh and establishing new ones to
the north, he had in effect shifted his position farther up the ridge, so that it
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still outreached Ochterlony’s in the direction of the Sutlaj and the crucially
important area of Bilaspur. He might thwart further attempts to outflank him
simply by repeating the manoeuvre. The contest would then develop into a
race to the north, in which Ochterlony could have no hope of overtaking his
adversary, because every step forward would manifoldly increase his
difficulties of communication and supply. The road even to Tibu was
impracticable for hullocks and, although only three miles long, required three
and a half hours’ marching even under the most favourable conditions. The
troops there had no tents, and the officers only small canvas shelters open at
both ends. Ochterlony could now have bombarded Ramgarh from the south,
since all its outlying positions on that side had been evacuated and he
already had a post at Kahanani on the crest—but this would have done no
good. The effect would still only have been to drive the elusive Gurkha farther
up the ridge towards the impenetrable wilderness of Bilaspur, and a decisive
issue to the campaign would have been as far off as ever.
So it seemed that there was deadlock. Assault was futile; blockade
impracticable. The contest threatened to become a war of attrition in which
time was on the side of the enemy. There is no need to explain what would
have been the reaction of Martindell or John Wood under circumstances such
as these. Ochterlony was just as liable as they were to express a sense of
helplessness; hut the difference was that with him it was no reflection of real
incapacity. It was only a plea for sympathy. Ochterlony had rich reserves of
talent which were released by adversity and stimulated by the solicitous
attention of his superiors; and now that his difficulties were most complex and
the despondent concern of his Commander-in-Chief moat gratifying, he
revealed his full brilliance as a strategist.
All the while he remained in his present situation, Amar Singh Thapa
was immune from assault and straitenment. The only way to destroy his
immunity was therefore to draw him into another position, where he would be
deprived of his a priori advantage of unrestricted access to the north. Behind
Ochterlony’s camp at Nori, parallel to but yet higher than the Ramgarh ridge,
lay a third range of hills, dominated by the fortress of Malaun. That, Ochterlony decided, was where he wanted the Gurkha. Lawtie set to work, and after
a month of crippling exertion had collected enough information about the
layout of the Malaun ridge to enable his commander to devise a bold and
ingenious plan.
Ochterlony’s idea was to seal the eastern, southern and northern
approaches to this ridge, inveigle Amar Singh Thapa into quitting the
Ramgarh range and concentrating his army in Malaun, and then attack the
cornered Nepalis as opportunity might best dictate. The crucial assumption in
the plan was that Amar Singh could be induced to move to Malaun, and at
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first glance it seems that Ochterlony was so sanguine as to expect his
adversary to walk into what would obviously be an ambush. But in fact the
plan’s mechanism would be less apparent than that. The move to block the
northern end of the Malaun ridge would not take place until the Kaji had
actually entered Malaun fort. In its first stages Ochterlony’s manoeuvre would
bear the appearance simply of a preparation to attack Malaun from the east,
which it was hoped would cause the Kaji to move all his men to defend the
fort. Here Ochterlony was gambling on Amar Singh’s concern for his treasure
and his youngest son and kinswomen, all, as was known from intercepted
letters, left in Malaun. However, there was the possibility that he would guess
Ochterlony’s ultimate intentions and march immediately to Bilaspur to protect
the source of his supplies and conserve his access to the north. The plan
was therefore designed to accommodate this eventuality. While the main
force and the auxiliaries moved, under Ochterlony’s own command, round
the southern end of the Malaun ridge and up into the Gamrola river valley on
its eastern side, Colonel Arnold was to be left with the force at Tibu to see
how the Gurkha reacted. If he moved across the Gambar and entered
Malaun, Arnold was first to expel any remaining detachments from the
Ramgarh range, then move up the Gambar valley to the town Of Bilaspur in
the plain beyond its northern end, overawe the Raja and secure a position on
the northern extremity of the Malaun ridge. If, on the other hand, Amar Singh
marched north to Bilaspur, Arnold was to follow. Octhterlony planned to have
a force moving northwards up the Gamrola valley simultaneously, so that
when the Nepali army arrived at Bilaspur it would be caught in a pincer
movement by a pursuing column and one emerging from the eastern side of
the ridge. The enemy would be forced into an engagement on a plain, where
all their best-tried tactics would be useless.
The operation was set in motion on n6 January, and in one swift
movement Ochterlony successfully accomplished his own manoeuvre. He
crossed the Gambar river south from Nori, continued round the southern end
of the Malaun ridge, turned north into the Gamrola valley and finally halted
near the village of Barog, which was on a latitude slightly south of that of
Malaun fort itself. Lieutenant Ross, with 2,000 Hindur auxiliaries, then
continued up the bank of the Gamrola for Bilaspur. The Hindur troops, used
to this sort of ground, covered the distance in a trice, relishing the opportunity
of dealing a blow at the Bilaspurians, who were their mortal enemies. They
occupied the Bandela heights, which over-hook the town of Bilaspur, and
then moved on to attack a force assembled under Shiva Dat Rai himself. This
they triumphantly dispersed. Trembling for his life, Raja Maha Chand scuttled
across the Sutlaj, convinced that his capital was about to be sacked by the
Hindur troops, who were baying for blood. But Ross had strict orders to
restrain his men from inflicting this final indignity. In Ochterlony’s view,
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consigning the town to destruction would have been both repugnant to
humanity and contrary to policy. He was relying on its granaries to replenish
Arnold’s stock of provisions, which was sufficient only for a week; and he was
besides anxious to coax Maha Chand into actively supporting the British,
which might be done it they showed themselves to be forbearing deliverers,
but not if they descended on him like butchers.
Meanwhile, back in the Gambar valley, Arnold had awaited the reaction
of Amar Singh Thapa to Ochterlony’s movement. As had been anticipated
and hoped, the Kaji’s immediate concern was for the safety of his treasure
and family. As soon as he perceived the direction of the Major-General’s
march, he reduced the garrisons in Ramgarh and three other main positions
along the ridge to a company each, gathered his men about him, quitted
Mango and hurried across the valley to Malaun. It now only remained for
Arnold to complete the British ambush of that place by joining Ross at
Bilaspur. On 18 January he sent men to occupy the deserted fort at Mangu;
then, leaving Lieutenant-Colonel Cooper with the heavy guns and a force of
sepoys to reduce Ramgarh and the remaining occupied posts on the ridge,
prepared to march north up the Gambar valley.
It was at this stage that the whole plan was menaced by disaster. That
brisk advance on Bilaspur which Ochterlony had prescribed for Arnold’s force
became in effect an agonizing crawl. First the march was delayed by
desertions among the coolies and porters; and then the route up the left bank
of the Gambar river, over the spreading feet of the spurs which buttressed
the western face of the Malaun ridge, was found to be atrocious beyond
anything that local informants had implied. Finally, to fill the cup of frustration
and disappointment, the weather turned viciously wintry. A heavy fall of snow
obstructed the march for two days and made the road to Bilaspur even more
inhospitable; and when the sepoys at last moved on, they trudged through
lashing sleet aid freezing slush. Nepali snipers still prowling on the Ramgarh
ridge added to their tribulations. Ochterlony, tired and trembling for the
success of his plan, began to show signs of strain. He became edgy and
peevish, and carped at Arnold for petty things—such as the style of his
reports. These unforeseen difficulties turned his plan into a dangerous
gamble. All the while the British army remained into two unconnected
sections, divided by a ridge in the possession of the enemy, its vulnerability
was extreme. Had Amar Singh Thapa decided to attack, the odds would have
been heavily in his favour. Ochterlony, having noted the Gurkha’s persistent
reluctance to take the offensive, had incurred this as a calculated risk; but he
had not reckoned on such a prolongation of the enemy’s advantage, which
obviously made it more likely that that advantage would be perceived and
exploited. These three weeks were Amar Singh’s time of both great danger
and supreme opportunity. A plan was in operation whose completion would
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ensure his defeat; but until it was complete, he derived overwhelming benefit
from the movements Ochterlony had been compelled to make. Inaction was
bound to have disastrous consequences; whereas action would offer the
possibility of decisive victory. Luckily for Ochterlony, Amar Singh did not act,
and thereby forfeited his claim to be a good general as opposed to merely a
brave soldier and patriot. Either his mind was too slow to follow Ochterlony’s
intentions, or he failed to appreciate that his fortresses could not withstand
the British artillery. Arnold marched on without molestation, save that offered
by sporadic discharges of musketry from the Ramgarh ridge. He reached the
northern end of the Malaun range by the second week in February and
established himself in a position within three miles of Bilaspur. His men were
exhausted and wretched, but the turning-point in the campaign had been
passed.
Now that Arnold’s force was safely in the vicinity of Bilaspur, only a few
of Ross’s auxiliaries were needed on the Bandela heights, so Ochterlony
transferred the greater part of the Hindur troops, together with all the
pioneers and 200 sepoys, to Cooper, still at Nori. Cooper then made
preparations to eject the troops which Amar Singh Thapa had left in the main
forts on the Ramgarh ridge.
There were still Nepali garrisons in Ramgarh fort itself, and in the less
elaborate stone sangars at Jorjoru, Taragarh and Chamba, which were
widely spaced along the crest of the ridge farther north. Ramgarh contained
about 100 men; Jorjoru about 16o; and the others about 100 each. Cooper
first concentrated on getting a position on the crest between Ramgarh and
Jorjoru. Lawtie and 600 auxiliaries left camp to climb the ridge in the small
hours of 12 February. The ground was rough, steep and hard with frost; but
this was the Hindur soldiers’ own country, and they had reached the crest by
daylight, unseen by the enemy. They took up a position about 750 yards
north of Ramgarh.
Soon members of the garrison were seen scurrying among the clutter
of huts and ramshackle outworks under the walls of the fort, intent on
protecting their three guns, which were in a stone emplacement in front of the
northward-facing main gateway. A party advanced, Khukuris unsheathed, as
if to give battle; but the Hindurians immediately riposted with a menacing
movement forward, striking up their own martial tune. The Nepalis thereupon
halted and, taking cover behind rocks and bushes, resorted to sniping. The
guns in front of the gateway were also occasionally discharged; but their
shot, of which the heaviest was only 3 or 4 lb., invariably went wide. By four
in the afternoon Lawtie had coaxed up an elephant with a six-pounder
strapped to its back, and he set up the gun to give cover to the pioneers who
were now on the crest busy constructing two batteries-one for mortars at 300
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yards, and one for the eighteen-pounders at between 500 and 750.
Meanwhile parties of auxiliaries took possession of all the pinnacles between
Ramgarh and Jorjoru. All had been stockade by the Nepalis, who, on
evacuating them, had left the defences conveniently infact. Several
reinforcements were sent from Nori, and by nightfall 1,200 auxiliaries were
posted along the heights.
The batteries were ready by ten o'clock the next morning and work was
begun on preparing a road for the eighteen-pounders from Nori to the crest of
the ridge. The pioneers dug, blasted, felled trees and built parapets all
through the day and night, while the six-pounder and two small mortars
already aloft maintained a slow and regular fire to prevent the enemy form
removing their guns from the emplacement. The eighteen-pounders were
trundled from the park at Nori at noon on 14 February, with three complete
companies-270 men-assigned as a working party to each. Yard by yard they
were hauled up the 1,200-foot ascent. Only a third of the distance was
covered that day, and not until ten o'clock on the morning of the 15 th was the
first piece in battery. It was aimed at the Nepali gun emplacement. An hour
later it discharged its first ball with an explosion that was heard thirty miles
away, in Nahan. Fifty rounds had been expended by one o'clock, and two of
the enemy guns buried under a pile of rubble. One embrasure was still intact;
but the Nepali artillerists wee so encumbered by masonry and coutinuing fire,
that they could make no use of the cannon inside. The second eighteenpounder arrived in battery at three in the afternoon. Both guns were then
aimed at the wall of the fort itself, but before they opened the garrison was
given a chance to surrender. Liberal terms were offered, because Ochterlony,
anxious not only to spare the lives of his own men, but also to increase the
difficulties of supply in Malaun, had instructed that the garrison of each fort
was to be allowed to join Amar Singh Thapa with all its arms and property.
The Ramgarh garrison nevertheless rejected such terms, and prepared to
resist a storm. Stones were gathered and piled in heaps on the bastions,
ready to be rolled down on an assaulting party.
At dawn on the 16th the same terms were again offered and were again
rejected. Consequently, at eight o’clock, the heavy guns were reopened. Two
hundred rounds were discharged before any effect was noticeable. Then the
walls began to split, loose stones began to tumble and crumbled mortar
began to cascade. Still the solid iron balls thumped into the flank of the fort—
50, 100, 150 more. Suddenly, at three in the afternoon, with a loud roar and a
rushing sound the whole curtain opposite the battery collapsed into a single
heap. At last there was a breach; but it was not wide enough to storm. The
shot flew on, now fragmenting the ragged fringes of the gap and shaking
down great masses of masonry both outside and inside the fort. To intensify
the destruction shrapnel shells were occasionally fired from the six-pounder.
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Great commotion was now visible in Ramgarh. At four o’clock a
messenger appeared in the breach waving a white flag. The guns were
silenced while he discussed terms with Lawtie. Finally, at sunset, after a long
conference, a treaty was signed. The garrison of Ramgarh was permitted to
march to Malaun with all its arms, colours, musical instruments and public
and private property, including cannon; and it was agreed that all belongings
which could not conveniently be carried away at once should be preserved
until they could be sent for. In return, the Subadar commanding consented to
try to persuade the garrison of Jorjoru to surrender on the same terms. He
was as good as his word, and that fort capitulated at noon the following day.
Thus two formidable strongholds were captured without the loss of a
single life—virtually, in fact, without a single casualty, because the only
wounded man in Lawtie’s force was a Sikh auxiliary who injured himself while
attempting to plunder some caves. The Field Engineer had managed the
whole operation with tact, judgement, and unflagging endurance. After the
treaty was signed he quitted the battery for the first time in seventy-two
hours.
At Headquarters, everyone was relieved to hear of the fall of Ramgarh,
and Hastings paid handsome tribute to Ochterlony’s enterprise and to the
‘cheerful patience’ shown by his sepoys under such abnormal stresses. But
the success did not dispel his misgivings. He remained convinced that the
rains would set in before the war in this quarter had reached a conclusive
issue. On the scene of operations, the way of thinking of one person at least
was in harmony with the Governor-General’s—and that was Amar Singh
Thapa. Never for a moment did he relax his posture of self-assurance. The
attitude of his own government, supine and disposed to sue for peace after
the loss of Kalanga, exasperated him and made him even more defiant.
Seeing that the administration in Kathmandu, having committed the initial
error of provoking the war, was now contemplating the even greater blunder
of a premature and disastrous peace, he envisaged himself as the sole remaining cantilever of the Gurkha empire: its isolated guardian, appointed by
the gods to fight not only a strong enemy without, but also weak and foolish
ministers within, and preserve it inviolate. On 23 December the Raja had sent
Ranjor Singh, Amar Singh Thapa’s son (who was, it will be remembered,
defending Jaithak), a letter enjoining him to treat for peace. He was
authorized to surrender all the disputed lowlands. If that was insufficient to
buy peace, he was to offer as well the whole of the Tarai and Dehra Dun; and
if this was still not enough, he might cede in addition all the mountainous
country from Debra Dun to the Sutlaj.153 Ranjor sent a copy of this missive to
The instructions are summarized in Amar Singh Thapa’s reply of 2 March 1815 to the Raja. This letter was
intercepted and is to be found printed in its entirety in several places, e.g.: P.R.N.W., pp. 553 et seq.; J.B.Fraser,
153
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his father, who agreed to negotiate on the basis of the surrender of the
disputed lowlands, but flatly refused to offer more. This was tantamount to
saying that he would fight on regardless of instructions from Kathmandu,
because, having already tried to propitiate the British with them and failed, he
knew full well that his terms would never end the war. The further concessions he emphatically deprecated, since in his view they were as
extensive as the worst sacrifices that defeat could entail, which it would be
shameful to offer before defeat was even a reality. On a March he sent the
Raja a long reply (which, being intercepted by the British, never arrived in
Kathmandu). It was a mixture of cantankerous reproach, grim warning and
urgent reassurance. He upbraided him for his folly in instigating a war for
trifles; warned that appeasing the British by such large concessions would
merely inflame their cupidity (he advised the Raja to ponder the fate of Tipu
Sultan of Mysore); and bade him take heart, for the East India Company was
not invincible—as was clearly proved by its failures at Bharatpur—and the
Sikhs and Marathas were bitt waiting for a Gurkha victory as the signal for
joining a grand coalition against it.154 He counselled conciliation of the
brahmins as a means of mollifying the gods and suggested that the Raja,
acting in his capacity as loyal vassal of the Emperor, invoke the aid of China
by representing the British intention to be the conquest of Tibet.
It was a stirring exhortation: the war speech of an informed rhetorician,
rich with that speciousness which a dextrous manipulation of historical
references and a cunning presentation of enticing possiblities can give. Amar
Singh had in fact received no indication that the Sikhs were prepared to join
the Gurkhas. Ranjit Singh had made it clear that he would not ally himself
with them while his relations with the British remained friendly; but the Kaji,
himself an opportunist par excellence, obviously believed, and perhaps with
reason, that if the British were brought to the point of submission an entirely
new political situation would arise which such opportunist powers as the
Sikhs, the Marathas and even the dynasty of Oudh would be unable to resist
exploiting to the detriment of the Company.
Convinced that the defeat of Ochterlony was not only essential for the
preservation of the Gurkha empire, but also the means of creating a situation
which would favour its expansion, he refused to allow himself even to
contemplate failure, and stifled symptoms of it with the tyranny of a religious
bigot whose creed is assailed. The Ramgarh garrison had their ears and
Journal of a Tour, Appendix V; H. H. Wilson, History of British India, vol. ii, Appendix A; Prinsep, op. cit., vol. i,
Appendix B. A MS. version is in Home Misc., vol. 653, ff. 179, et seq.
154
The expression he used was ‘the Chiefs of the Deccan’. It is unlikely that he was referring to the state of Hyderabad.
Deccan is probably used in its general sense of ‘south' here, the reference being to the Marathas.
187
noses cut off as a punishment for unjustified surrender, and the castellan was
shackled with irons. The Subadar in charge of the force would have been
summarily executed had not Bhakti Thapa, the Kaji’s more humane principal
lieutenant, interceded on his behalf. It would be a mistake to think that Amar
Singh Thapa was wilfully deceiving himself. He had been informed of the
dispatch of a large reinforcement from Kathmandu, said to amount to twentyseven companies of 100 men each. This was known to have almost reached
Kumaun, and he confidently expected that it would join him in Malaun within
a few weeks. He judged that when it arrived he would have enough men to
launch a decisive counter-attack against Ochterlony. Meanwhile, he made a
determined effort to redeem the worst consequences of the capitulation of
Ramgarh by reinforcing the troops still in Taragarh and Chamba.
When he heard of the arrival of these extra men, Cooper, hitherto
occupied in strengthening the defences of Ramgarh, which now replaced
Nalagarh as the principal British depot, made preparations for reducing the
two remaining forts. The eighteen-pounders bombarded Taragarh for more
than twenty-four hours without making a breach. At daybreak on the 12th it
was discovered that the fort had been evacuated during the night. When
Cooper’s men occupied it, they found that the wall facing the battery had
been lined, so that the total thickness was twelve feet at the bastions and
sixteen feet at the curtain.
It now only remained to reduce Chamba, six miles still farther north. The
auxiliaries under Lawtie pushed forward to take up a position about 350 yards
before the fort, and the pioneers set to work yet once snore to make a road.
The Bengal Pioneers or Sappers were not without their critics. They were
said to have malingered in Java, and to have refused to bury the dead. But
there is no indication that indolence or caste-consciousness ever affected
their performance in any of the Nepal campaigns. In fact, they were a
mainstay of Ochterlony’s effort. By 16 March an eighteen-pounder had been
set up before Chamba, and it opened fire at half-past eleven. This time the
effects were swift. After only an hour one complete bastion had been reduced
to rubble, and the garrison surrendered. There were only fifty men in the fort,
the rest having already absconded. So greatly did they dread the wrath of
their commander, that they begged for quarter as prisoners of war, which was
granted. Seeing that they remained very apprehensive lest in his
vindictiveness the Kaji should make their families atone for the capitulation,
Cooper agreed to continue firing blank cartridges, so hat Amar Singh should
not guess what had occurred, while two of heir number went to Malaun to
bring away the prisoners women and children.
So were the enemy dislodged from their last footholds on the Ramargh
ridge. Only small detachments of auxiliaries were needed to man the
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captured fortresses, and the 1,100 regulars under Cooper were made free to
assist Ochterlony’s measures against the main Gurkha army in Malaun.
When Amar Singh Thapa realized that Chamba had surrendered and its
garrison defected, he was enraged. To give vent to his vexation and to
reanimate his troops, whose morale was flagging under the inertia caused by
Ochterlony’s blockade, he at last made up his mind to take the offensive. But
he planned only a token attack, whose virtue was sure success rather than
tactical purpose. He selected as his prey not one of the detachments of
regular troops in the Gamrola valley, but a party of Sikh auxiliaries who had
taken post on the western flank of the Malaun ridge, above the Gambar river.
Late on 19 March, he sent a party of 400 men from Malaun. They crept
towards the unsuspecting Sikhs in the half-light of the evening, and then lay
quiet until the moon had gone down. 300 Sikhs were in an outwork and some
900 below, in the main stockade. The Nepalis assaulted in three groups,
screaming their war cry. There was a noise like that of ripping tarpaulin as the
lirst body discharged a volley; then the second and third attacked the outpost
and stockade simultaneously. The Sikhs, taken completely unawares, made
only feeble efforts to defend themselves. Those in the outpost were literally
made mincemeat of, and only sixty survived. In the stockade there was
pandemonium, and all the occupants fled, long hair loose and streaming.
But this cheap triumph can have caused only transitory exultation
among the troops in Malaun, because it had no important long-term
consequences and was not dazzling enough to disguise the grave portent of
other events to the north, south and east. Slowly, a cordon was tightening
around them.
Maha Chand of Bilaspur, at last convinced that the grand Gurkha
vessel was doomed, had lowered himself hurriedly into the modest lifeboat
proffered by the British. For a fortnight he had resisted Ochterlony’s
summons to change his allegiance, hoping to barter his support against a
recognition of his claim to the Twelve Lordships; but at the end of February,
hearing of Arnold’s advance towards his capital and aware of the new
posture of affairs, he had attached himself ‘heart and soul to the British
Government’ in return for a sanad which confirmed to him only the territories
which he then possessed on the eastern bank of the Sutlaj. He became a
protégé of the East India Company, but was exempted from tribute. When he
received news of the Raja’s tergiversation, Shiva Dat Rai fled across the
Sutlaj into the territories of Ranjit Singh, and Amar Singh Thapa’s remaining
influence in Bilaspur was destroyed. He lost the services of his 1,000 Bilaspur
auxiliaries, while Arnold’s force was furnished with plentiful supplies and
given access to the stronghold of Ratanpur, which was on the Malaun range
and barely two miles north of Malaun fort itself. The Kaji’s passage to the
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north was at last stopped, and the co-operation of O’Brien, who still had not
sent Ochterlony a final reply, was made a matter of little consequence. This
was just as well, because it seems that that extraordinary character had
composed his quarrel with Sansar Chand and given up the idea of deserting.
Probably, in one of his few moments of sober reflection he had realized that
he would have made a poor bargain by exchanging the princely powers, the
unlimited liquor and the copious harem which he enjoyed in Kotoch for the
dubious advantages of a free pardon from the Governor-General.155 On 1
April, Amar Singh Thapa’s access to the south was also blocked. On that
day, Colonel Cooper, with the troops from the Ramgarh ridge, occupied a hilt
on the southern end of the Malaun range. In its new position his force was
only a mile or two below Surjagarh, the fort south of Malaun which was
occupied by Amar Singh’s best officer, Bhakti Thapa. Meanwhile, in addition
to his accumulating advantages of ground, Ochterlony had begun to derive
great benefit from his own corps of Nepalis. This was composed of deserters
and prisoners of war. At the beginning of April there were 324 of these in the
British camp, and they had quite won over the Major-General by their sunny
nature, their industry and their eagerness to gratify. He resolved to form them
into a separate battalion of three companies. ‘I shall with the sanction and
approbation of His Excellency call it the “Nasiri [friendly] Paltan” and consider
myself their commandant and patron. These trifles have great weight; and I
must confess myself sanguine in my hopes of their not discrediting my
favour.’ It was this body which formed the nucleus of the regiment later called
the 1st Gurkha Rifles.
The steady trickle of deserters from Amar Singh Thapa’s camp was a
sure indication that the policy of blockade was beginning to / have an effect.
Time, however, was running short. By early March the pear trees in the
Gamrola valley were already in blossom. The Himalayan spring, in the
urgency of its parturience, had pushed winter violently aside; and within a
couple of months it too would be unceremoniously displaced by the rains,
when all military operations would be impracticable. Determined to deprive
his adversary of the advantages of such respite, Ochterlony devised a
complex and daring maneouvre, which, if successful, would give him a
position on the Malaun ridge from which he could hammer the fort into
submission. As soon as he had finished his work in the vicinity of Ramgarh,
Peter Lawtie began making an intricate reconnaissance of the hills around
Malaun. Ochterlony afterwards acknowledged that it was entirely to his
‘intelligent mind, diligent inquiry, and personal observation’ that he owed the
information essential for the construction of his plan.
The Malaun ridge rises four and a half thousand feet above the level of
155
When William Moorcroft visited Kotoch in 1820, O’Brien was still in the Raja’s employ.
190
the sea and two thousand above the Gamrola stream, which flows in a deep
channel along its eastern base. The spine of the ridge is narrow and jagged.
The ground falls steeply from it, in places precipitously, to swell out into broad
spurs, on whose level ledges stand little hamlets. Scraggy vegetation sprouts
here and there; but generally the slopes are arid, gaunt and brutally scarred
by water-worn furrows. On a commanding height towards the northern
extremity was the stone fort of Malaun: long, with square bastions, and
deprived of apparent height by the massive proportions of the rock on which
it sprawled. The cantonments were outside the fort—a clutter of huts huddling
under its eastern walls, protected by a semi-circular stockade. Bhakti Thapa’s
headquarters were about four miles farther south, in the fort of Surjagarh.
The Nepali forces were concentrated in and about these two centres.
Stockades and redoubts, scattered over the different levels of the ridge,
clustered around them like electrons around nuclei. But the two configurations did not meet. Between their outer orbits on the crest there was a vacant
space, called Raila Peak by the British.
Equipped with a thorough knowledge of the ground, Ochterlony
completed his plan. Although it involved several simultaneous movements, it
was basically very simple. His aim was to establish two positions on the crest
of the ridge: one at Raila, to hold Bhakti Thapa at bay; and one on a vacant
site within the system of defences around Malaun, south of the fort and
separated from it by two intervening stockades. For easy identification, this
site was labelled Dionthal.
Starting from different positions in the Gamrola valley, three columns
were to advance up the eastern flank of the ridge on converging lines, finally
to meet at Raila Peak. At the same time, two columns were to leave the
valley from points farther north and converge on Dionthal. Such were the
main movements of the plan. But in addition, in order to distract Amar Singh
Thapa’s attention from the columns advancing to Dionthal, a feint attack on
the Malaun cantonments was organized. One party was to advance on them
from the Gamrola valley, while another approached from the north, so that
the two lines of attack were at a right angle. The northern column was to
come from Colonel Arnold’s position at Ratanpur, and would have to cross
the thousand-feet-deep ravine which separated that fort from Malaun.
All these movements were to begin on the morning of 15 April; at a
prearranged signal. This was to be given by the central column of the Lila
operation, when it had reached its destination.
The Raila operation was accomplished without a hitch. The three
columns which were to converge on Raila can be labelled the left
(southernmost), the central, and the right.
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The central column moved first. Led by Lieutenant Fleming, it quitted
the village of Patta in the valley late on the night of 14 April. It consisted of
1,100 men, and included 300 of the Nasiri Battalion under Lawtie. This was
the first occasion when ‘Gurkha’ troops went into action as British
mercenaries, and they immediately impressed their officer by the closeness
of their files and their perfect silence, both maintained over even the most
difficult ground. The column reached Lila Peak at one o’clock in the morning
of 15 April, having encountered no opposition, and made the signal flare. This
was answered from a hill in the rear of Ochterlony’s camp, and the other
columns immediately moved. On the right, Major Innes with the Grenadier
Battalion and two six-pounders moved from headquarters and ascended to
Raila ‘in admirable order’. The left-hand column, led by Lieutenant Hamilton,
moved from a small village called Jainagar on the lower slopes of the ridge
below Surjagarh. It was composed of troops from Cooper’s post at Lag Hill, at
the extreme south of the ridge, who had moved to their starting position
during the night. The column was fired on from an enemy stockade as it
marched up the flank of the ridge; but the men pressed on in perfect
composure and reached the summit without mishap. Meanwhile Raila Peak
had been stockaded by a group of pioneers, enthusiastically assisted by the
Nasiris, who seemed oblivious of the musket fire from the fort.
The Dionthal operation was the focus of Ochterlony’s plan. Two
columns marched up to the site: Major Laurie’s on the right (400 auxiliaries),
and Colonel ‘Thompson’s on the left (1,300 regulars, 300 auxiliaries, and two
six-pounders). The heads of the columns arrived at Dionthal almost at the
same time, but the guns still lagged a long way behind. A patter of firing to
the north telling him that the diverting columns had begun their work,
Thompson mustered his three companies of light infantry and, leaving the
rest of the combined columns under Laurie to wait at Dionthal for the guns,
marched boldly northwards up the crest of the ridge to seize a position for a
battery nearer Malaun. Enemy musketeers, sniping from behind rocks and
bushes, tried unsuccessfully to check him. But as he approached the nearer
of the two stockades which commanded his path to the fort, a party of
Nepalis threw themselves from it with khuhuris drawn. The sepoys, steadfast
enough under invisible musket shot, shrank at the sight of knives whose
lightest stroke drew blood. They greatly outnumbered their antagonists; but
their officers cursed and cajoled in vain. They would not use their bayonets.
Breaking formation, they fell over themselves in their anxiety to get back to
Dionthal, where Laurie and his men were luckily prepared to cover their
retreat. The Nepalis did not attempt to assault the Dionthal position, but took
cover behind rocks and trees and began sniping. The pioneers worked
feverishly to raise a breastwork; but enemy marksmen were everywhere and
because of the ruggedness of the ground had cover to within twenty yards of
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the position. Soon the sepoys were visibly flagging, ammunition and water
were getting low, the six-pounders still did not arrive and pioneers were being
picked off at an alarming rate. Crichton, the Surgeon, could not cope with all
the wounded, and made an urgent request for assistance. Thompson feared
that he would be unable to strengthen his post sufficiently to withstand the
attack which he was sure must come during the night. Ochterlony was in
agonies of anxiety, and told him to fight to the last man. If his position was
lost, the whole plan would be wrecked. During the afternoon the MajorGeneral withdrew two companies of infantry from Lila and transferred them to
Dionthal; and Ram Saran, the Raja of Hindur, provided men to replenish the
depleted ranks of Thompson’s pioneers. Nevertheless, for the rest of the day
it remained touch and go whether the force at Dionthal would be able to hold
its position. The elephants carrying the six-pounders arrived on the crest late
in the afternoon, but there were only eight European matrosses to serve the
guns, and before long one of these had been wounded. At dusk Thompson
was still in possession of his ground, but the hours of darkness were a time of
terrible suspense. All the troops knew that the worst was yet to come,
because it was certain that sooner or later the Nepalis would make a fullscale attempt to dislodge them.
It was a mercy that the diversion had long averted from Thompson’s
detachment the brunt of the Nepali resistance.
Captain Charles Showers, who led the column from Ratanpur, was an
earnest young officer who combined magnificent courage and chivalry with a
puritanical sobriety. He had sworn that he would never accept a challenge to
a duel, and always said that he trusted to his profession to provide him with a
more appropriate claim to the title of soldier.
At the head of the battalion (the 1st/19th Native Infantry) of which he had
assumed the command at the outset of the war, he marched from Ratanpur
early on the morning of 15 April. He had first to descend the slopes which
plunge into the ravine between Ratanpur and Malaun, and then cover the
long and difficult ascent to the Nepali cantonments. Its climb took his column
by an enemy stockade, which was on a ledge to its left, about 100 feet below
Malaun fort. This was passed without incident; but at about half-past ten,
when the force was half-way between the stockade and its objective, a party
of the enemy issued from the cantonments and came down to the attack.
Showers, seeing that they were numerically considerably inferior to his own
column, commanded his men not to load but to scatter the pack with their
bayonets. The first part of his order they obeyed. The second part they did
not. Showers had forgotten what had been demonstrated time and time
again: that the Bengal sepoy’s musket was his fetish. His men hung back,
chilled with fear. Striving to inspirit them by his own example, Showers drew
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his sword and ran forward alone, outstripping even his orderlies. A Gurkha
officer came towards him. Showers coaxed him forward with taunting
gestures, and soon had him on a desperate defensive. Then, with a sudden
vigorous lunge, he killed the Gurkha. As he struggled to pull out his sabre, he
swayed under the weight of the corpse, which was on higher ground. Seeing
him encumbered, the Nepalis sprang forward and stabbed him to death.
Horrified, his sepoys receded. The enemy took tip the pursuit, gaining
confidence as the momentum of their descent increased. Some sepoys
turned about and ran; and as others followed their example the retreat
became a general flight down the crumbling contours of the gorge. Not until
they reached the plateau of a small village 1,500 feet below did Lieutenant
Rutledge, on whom the command had devolved, manage to halt and rally the
men. Once they had had time to load their muskets they became more
amenable, and responded obediently when Rutledge ordered them to chase
the enemy back up the hill. Colonel Arnold had been watching operations
from Ratanpur, and when he saw Showers killed and his men routed, lie
immediately ordered forward a third column of diversion. In a stockade called
Tipnu, on the eastern side of the ridge below Ratanpur, there was a party of
Sikh auxiliaries and a Subadar’s party of regulars. Arnold directed these
troops to advance on that enemy stockade below the cantonments which
Showers had passed on his ascent. This they did with exemplary
enthusiasm. The Subadar was killed; but the leader of the Sikhs, Ghoshi
Ram, led the party right up to the stockade and would probably have entered
it had not some of his men wavered at the last minute. Rutledge’s fresh
advance to their right now afforded this party support and cover for its retreat.
Meanwhile, farther south, Captain Bowyer, leading the second diverting
column from the valley floor, had reached Malaun village, which was about
1,000 feet below the fort. At about eleven o’clock came news of Showers’s
death and the overpowering of his column. Bowyer persisted at his post for
another hour and then, deciding that action against the Malaun cantonments
with his limited resources alone was bound to be abortive, he ordered a
withdrawal to the Tipnu stockade. The retreat was performed with field-day
precision, one half of the detachment retiring to a rear position and the
remainder then following under cover of its fire. It was during their retreat that
the sepoys of this detachment finally derived support from the other diverting
column, Arnold having ordered Rutledge to incline to his left to help cover
Bowyer s movement. The detachment finally reached the Tipnu stockade
with no more than fourteen casualties.
Despite their failure to penetrate the enemy cantonments, the diverting
columns had fulfilled their main purpose. For several crucial hours during the
morning they had almost monopolized Amar Singh Thapa’s attention and
thereby greatly lessened the opposition with which the Dionthal columns had
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had to contend. But their achievement had been costly. In an army in which
their importance was so exceptional and their numbers so inadequate, the
loss of any European officer was no light matter; but when the officer was
‘most zealous, brave, and excellent’, which is how Oehterlony described
Showers, the loss was especially grave. However, Showers had proved his
merit as a soldier, even in the estimation of his enemy. In the East, it is a
gesture of respect for a brave foe to cover his remains. When the bearers
went up the next day to retrieve Showers’s body, they found it laid on a bed
of leaves, wrapped in fine cloth.
Thus ended the grand concerted manoeuvre of 15 April. When night fell
Amar Singh Thapa was brooding within the walls of Malaun, conscious that
he had reached the most critical emergency of his career. If the British were
not expelled from the post they had gained at Dionthal, Malaunn must be
either strangled or bombarded into submission. Early in the night, Bhakti
Thapa decided that his own post, Surjagarh, must be sacrificed in an attempt
to preserve his chief’s headquarters. Prevented from attacking Thompson
from the south by the intervening British post of Raila, his force was of no
more use to Amar Singh than a severed limb. He therefore mustered his men
and, proceeding stealthily below the crest on the western flank of the ridge,
made for Malaun. He hoped to pass Innes’s and Thompson’s posts
unobserved, or at least unimpeded. But his design had been anticipated, and
Lieutenant Murray, in charge of the Hindur auxiliaries at Raila, had placed
himself and his men in a position commanding the Gurkha’s route. Falling
pitilessly on their inveterate enemies, the Hindurians turned Bhakti’s progress
to Malaun into an ungainly tumble.
Bhakti Thapa was the bravest officer in the Gurkha army, and the most
popular. When he arrived in Malaun, Amar Singh appointed him to lead a
dawn attack against Thompson’s position. He assigned to his command the
elite of his army: 2,000 warriors, all in scarlet broadcloth. It is said that Bhakti
delivered his son into the Kaji’s care, and solemnly swore that he would
return victorious or remain dead on the field. Shortly after four o’clock on the
morning of 16 April, having adjured his two wives to be prepared to sacrifice
themselves on his funeral pyre, he led his men from the fort. Silently, they
took up positions on the narrow ledges around Dionthal, clustering thick as
bristles on a hairbrush.
At a given signal they attacked, with a satanic din of war-cries and
trumpets. Musketeers opened fire from close range on the northern front and
both flanks of the post at Dionthal, but their main offensive was directed
against Thompson’s two six-pounders. Bhakti knew that if he could but
silence these, the proven superiority of his men in close combat would be
decisive. The guns had been placed in embrasures commanding the smooth
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ground on the western side of the position, which was the only approach free
of natural impediments. Naked khukuris in the right hand, loaded muskets in
the left, the Nepali assaulting party surged out of the darkness, straight
towards the cannon. There was a vivid flash, a crash, and red-hot blasts of
grapeshot dispersed them. So many Nepalis were killed and crippled that
their charge could not be completed, and Bhakti was forced to withdraw the
party to make good the losses. There were only seven British gunners. They
worked with fanatical haste to recharge the pieces, but were falling one after
another under the fire of the encircling enemy snipers. Again the Nepalis
charged; and again the hilltop shuddered and flared briefly into brilliance as
they were blown away from the mouths of the guns. Their defiance of these
impassive artefacts had an ecstatic nobility. Still once more the Gurkha chief
rallied and re-formed his men. Behind him, on a hill within musket range of
Dionthal, was Amar Singh Thapa himself. He stood conspicuously by a stand
of colours, urging on his troops. Again Bhakti Thapa ordered his men to
charge the guns, and again they obeyed magnificently. In the British battery
Lieutenant Cartwright of the artillery now had only one gunner undisabled,
and with him was loading one of the pieces himself. The other was being
served by Lieutenant Armstrong of the pioneers and Lieutenant Hutchinson
of the engineers, with the help of two pioneer sergeants. Before the next
discharge could be made, one of the sergeants spun away, shot through the
head. It seemed, for a second or two, that the battery was lost. But then,
when the Nepalis were only yards away, the guns finally recoiled and
disgorged, and swept them flat. Thwarted in this design, yet still sustained by
his adamantine courage, Bhakti Thapa collected the remnants of his storming
column and marched them over the crest to the eastern flank of the ridge,
with the intention of assaulting the British position from that direction. Here
Major Laurie and the Hindur Raja’s auxiliaries were posted with a body of
sepoys in a small outwork. Thompson decided that sepoys had misgivings,
the Hindur troops had none. They rushed among Bhakti’s men, and the
sepoys, inflamed by their example, followed close after. For nearly two hours,
the enemy disputed every yard of ground. Masses of combatants ebbed and
flowed in the slow straining rhythms of battle. No advantage was gained by
either side until suddenly, when light was beginning to turn the gunsmoke
yellowish grey, it was as if an invincible weariness quelled the Nepalis. In
trance-like abjection, they began to retire. The Hindur troops followed up their
advantage, and accomplished a massacre just as the sun was rising.
Amongst the grisly debris littering the windswept crest was the corpse
of a Nepali in the full-dress uniform of an officer. It was brought into the camp
at Dionthal for identification, and the Nasiris sorrowfully confirmed that it was
that of Bhakti Thapa. The reason for his men’s sudden surrender to despair
in the middle of the battle was now apparent. Ochterlony ordered that the
196
body be covered with shawls, and sent with an escort to Malaun. That night,
as Charles Showers was being buried with military honours in the valley,
there was a bright glow on the heights. It was Bhakti Thapa’s funeral pyre,
into the flames of which, in full sight of the British troops on the ridge, the
Gurkha hero’s distraught widows flung themselves.
When the muster roll was called, it was found that Thompson’s force
had suffered 253 casualties—but of these only 30 were fatal. Amar Singh’s
losses were much greater. 150 dead were left on the field alone, and it was
reckoned that his total casualties must have reached at least 5oo.
But the Gurkha Kaji had lost more than his best officer and a quarter of
his army. He had never commanded the affections of his men; and from this
time he was deprived even of their loyalty. Large numbers deserted every
day, despite his brutal efforts to prevent them. To add to his troubles, the
expected reinforcement from the east had been detained in Rumaun by
Brahma Shah and did not now seem likely ever to arrive in Malaun. Then
another of his subject allies, the Vizir of Basahar, defected to the British. This
minister, who had formed a part of Amar Singh’s retinue since the
subjugation of cis-Sutlaj Basahar in 1811, had come into Ochterlony’s camp
to proffer his allegiance even before the battle of Malaun, and on 13 April had
left to promote rebellion in his own country. Within a few weeks news arrived
from William Fraser that the Nepali occupationary force in Basahar, led by
Kirti Rana, had been attacked and dispersed. Meanwhile, Ochterlony’s
cordon round Malaun had continued to tighten. One by one all the enemy
posts around Malaun surrendered and were occupied, and work began on
clearing a way for heavy ordnance. On 7 May two brass twelve-pounders,
strapped to elephants, arrived on the crest.
As the situation outside Malaun became so ominous as to leave no
room for hope, the spirit of mutiny increased within. When they saw the
arrival of the twelve-pounders, all his principal sirdars, or lieutenants,
presented Amar Singh Thapa with an ultimatum. They demanded either food
for their men, or some decisive line of conduct. But Amar Singh, powerless to
attack again, yet withheld by stubbornness and pride from opening
negotiations for surrender, refused to stir from a state of taciturn inactivity.
Peevishly, he ordered his officers to await events; but they had no patience
for futile temporizing. They gathered their men, amounting to nearly 1,600,
left the fort and pledged their allegiance to the British. To army, reduced
already to half its original 4,000 by casualties and desertions, this was the
death blow. The old man in Malaun now had about him only 250 fighting
men. At last he sent an ungracious note to Ochterlony, demanding to know
his wishes; hut the Major-General replied that according to usage all
proposals must come from him. Thereupon the Kaji relapsed again into sullen
197
silence, struggling with his pride and—who knows?— perhaps still clutching
at the hope of a last-minute intervention by Ranjit Singh. It appears that he
made another application to the Sikh about this time: but Ranjit, while
confessing himself surprised at the swiftness of his defeat, had too many
problems of his own to help redeem it.
By 9 May emplacements for the twelve-pounders and mountain
howitzers had been constructed within battering distance of the southern
aspect of the fort, and on the following morning, at seven o’clock, the pieces
opened fire. The bombardment continued all day, save for a few intervals
during which notes were exchanged. The effect of the twelve-pounders was
perceptible, but slow; and the mountain howitzers, because of the flimsiness
of Hastings’s collapsible carriages, tumbled over like toy cannon every fourth
round or so. Ochterlony therefore decided that he must bring up the eighteenpounders; and it was the sight of fatigue parties labouring up the flank of the
ridge with these instruments of sure destruction that finally wrung from Amar
Singh Thapa a surly concession of defeat.
His youngest son, Ram Das, came to tell the British that his father was
willing to negotiate on the basis of the surrender of the fort; and in reply
Ochterlony offered liberal terms. Malaun and all the forts west of the Jumna,
including Jaithak, were to be evacuated, and such members of their garrisons
who did not choose to take service with the British would be allowed to march
unmolested back into the eastern provinces of Nepal with all their private
property. In addition, Amar Singh Thapa and his kinsmen would be permitted
to march with all their arms and accoutrements. Ochterlony’s forbearance is
all the more apparent when it is recalled that he and his army, according to
the usages of war, were entitled to the contents of Malaun (which included
the Kaji’s reputedly immense store of treasure) and of all the other captured
forts as prize money. His motive in conciliating the Gurkha was to induce him
to use those powers, which he was known to possess but which he not so far
exercised, to negotiate for a general peace treaty. His hopes in this direction,
however, were thwarted by Hastings, who had other plans. Brahma Shah,
governor of Kumaun, and a known opponent of the Thapa administration in
Kathmandu, had signified his desire to the Gurkha negotiator. The GovernorGeneral reckoned that he would be both more amenable and more sincere
as an agent than Amar Singh Thapa, and fancied that if the Thapas were
denied the prestige attaching to the conclusion of a satisfactory peace treaty,
their ruin, already half-assured by the disastrous issue of the war, would be
completed, and the way prepared for a return to power of the pro-British
Panre party. Ochterlony was therefore informed that the settlement with Amar
Singh should embrace no more than the conditions of the latter’s own
immediate surrender.
198
Smarting with chagrin and humiliation, Amar Singh resigned himself to
relinquishing the territories which it had taken him a decade of hard
campaigning to acquire. He was not noble in defeat. At the last minute, a
letter arrived from Brahma Shah, who was ignorant of the latest
developments in the west, announcing his own capitulation and advising
Amar Singh to follow suit. The Kaji thereupon insisted that a clause be
inserted into Ochterlony’s convention, stating that he agreed to its terms only
at the behest of the governor of Kumaun; and when informing the Raja of his
capitulation, he expressly stated that he had agreed to it on the authority of
Brahma Shah’s letter. It was a shabby stratagem, dictated equally by vanity
and malice. It was calculated not only to remove the obloquy attaching to his
own defeat from himself, but also to transfer it to his hated political enemy.
So he left Malaun, body ailing and mind poisoned by wormwood, and
made his way slowly back to Kathmandu. The empire which he had laboured
so long to build had collapsed around him, and the army which he had so
proudly and magisterially led had rejected him to serve his enemy. No fewer
than a,ooo Nepali soldiers had elected to stay with the British.
As for Ochterlony, he had snatched celebrity while on the brink of
obscure old age. From being one of the least known he had become one of
the most famous of Bengal officers and an acknowledged favourite of the
Governor-General. It had been intended that he should return to his old
command at Allahabad at the conclusion of the campaign; instead it was
Marley who was banished to that obscure backwater, vacating a place on the
general staff which Ochterlony was appointed to fill. In a flattering dispatch
from Headquarters, he was asked to proceed to Nahan and assume
command of the division under Martindell; but it so happened, as we have
seen, that Jaithak surrendered before this appointment became operative.
Ochterlony had, together with Gillespie, Martindell and George Wood,
been gazetted K.C.B. early in 1815, before news of his success reached
England; and when the Court of Directors of the East India Company heard
of the resounding victory that he had achieved, they supplemented the award
with a pension of £ 1,000 a year, ‘to enable him to live in a style
commensurate with the dignity bestowed on him by the Prince Regent’.
Ochterlony’s satisfaction was great; but it was not complete, for the
comrade he had come to love like a son never knew of the victory for which
they had both worked so hard. The death of Peter Lawtie of a typhus
infection, only a few days before the surrender of Malaun, cut him to the
quick. He requested all the officers of his division to wear mourning for a
month—a gesture unprecedented for someone so young.
199
It was by the division from which least had been expected that most
had been gained. Hastings was right to attribute the victory above all else to
Ochterlony’s brilliant quality as a commander— but in what, particularly, did
that quality consist? A list of his merits would include all those of a good
general—imagination, opportunism, courage, audacity and caution,
compounded in exactly the right proportions. But more than in any of these,
his quality consisted in that perspicacity which had enabled him to foresee
the necessity of guns, and in that calm patience and dogged determination
which had enabled him to eschew flashy exhibition of prowess and
concentrate with absolute seriousness on making use of them. Without the
use of artillery he could not have won the contest. Of that there is no doubt.
His infantry had been poor. The Bengal sepoys had made a show that
compared very unfavourably with that of their antagonists. There had been,
as ever, individual instances of bravery and heroism; but time and time again
they had demonstrated that in the particular art of close combat which
mountain warfare demanded they were quite unable to match the courage
and skill of the men against whom they were pitted. An anonymous civilian156
who accompanied the expedition was appalled by the lack of confidence, the
trepidation and the apathy which he had observed on their part. It caused him
to draw some alarming conclusions concerning the worth of the Bengal army.
‘They turned’, he wrote, ‘almost uniformly from the contest before a blow had
been struck, tinder the influence of a moral impulse which deterred them from
proving the badness of the ground and the inferiority of the bayonet.’ And
again: 'The physical mass of the army bent or broke like a useless weapon
whenever a blow was to be struck.’
These are severe strictures and perhaps, in his desire to shock the
authorities at home from their complacency, he exaggerated somewhat. It is
a fact that his accounts of engagements tend to differ from those contained in
official dispatches, in that they present a much less flattering picture of the
behaviour of the sepoys. This could be partly tendentious denigration; but, on
the other hand, it could be because his view, as a civilian, was less clouded
than that of the army officers, whose partiality and complaisance were the
156
Author of Military Sketches of the Goorkha War (p. xiv). W.G. Hamilton has suggested (J.U.S.1.I., xli, no. 189: Oct.
1912, p. 456) that this was Captain Edmund Cartwright, Ochterlony’s Major of Brigade. This is certainly not so. The
author, in his preface, distinctly states that he is a civilian and that he returned to England six years after the nr.
Cartwright is disqualified on both counts. It is possible that the author was Ochterlony’s own Eurasian son, R.P.
Ochterlony. He held an official position as Assistant to his father until July so it is more than likely that he
accompanied him during the first campaign. He announced his intention of resigning his post in July 1815, hut could
have accompanied his father ex officio on the second expedition in ,1816. See Ludhiana Records, pp. 535, 349, 458, for
references to this person.
200
subject of snore than one commentator’s criticism. But the essential truth of
his complaint is indisputable. It is attested by Ochterlony’s own views, and by
his consistent avoidance of full-scale infantry engagements. Infantry had
never formed the spearhead of his offensives. There had been no escalades,
and the foot soldiers had played a secondary role in the capture of every fort.
The most important attribute throughout had been his artillery.
But it was not only the particular and local circumstance of the
poorness of his infantry which had induced Ochterlony to rely most heavily on
his guns. He had discovered principles which enjoined their use in mountain
warfare in general.
The first of these principles was that in mountain warfare it was much
less important for an invader to equip himself to pursue than to equip himself
to dislodge his enemy. It had been assumed by many, including the
Governor-General, that the Nepalis’ main advantage would be their mobility.
The premise which underlay Hastings’s planning was that his divisions would
have to deal with an elusive antagonist. He had expected Amar Singh Thapa
to try to move either eastwards, or northwards, across the Sutlaj, and had
thought it likely that the main Kathmandu army would try to escape to the
west. For this reason, he had urged his commanders to make lightness and
mobility their primary attributes. But Ochterlony had doubted, from the outset,
that this was accurate reasoning. He had therefore equipped himself to fight
a static, fortified enemy; and the event had completely vindicated his policy. It
had transpired that in practice the Gurkhas treated as their main asset not
their elusiveness, but their inaccessibility. They had shown themselves very
unwilling to budge from positions they had occupied, and only abandoned
them as a last resort. It was his underestimation of the advantages which
defenders derive from mountain topography which had caused Hastings to
suppose that the Gurkhas would try to concentrate their forces. Unlike
Ochterlony—and Napoleon—he failed to realize that in mountain warfare the
attacker is at a disadvantage, since his main task must be to oust his
adversary from positions which are virtually immune to assault.157 It was the
Nepalis’ reluctance to move, their stolid defence of every yard of ground,
which had rendered artillery indispensable. Even with the best soldiers in the
157
Napoleon wrote as follows on the subject: ‘Dans la guerre de montagnes. celui qui attaque a du désavantage . . .
Dans Ia guerre de montagnes, obliger l’ennemi a sortir de scs positions pour attaquer tes votres, c’est ce que nous avons
dit etre dans le genie et dana la bonne conduite de cette guerrc . . . Ne jamais attaquer les troupes qui occupent de
bonnes positions . . . mais les debusquer en occupant des camps sur les flancs ou leurs derrieres.’ (Quoted by Hough,
The Englishman, 16Oct. 1846.)
201
world, it seems unlikely that Ochtcrlony could have taken their hill forts
without it.
The second principle which Ochterlony had discovered and illustrated
was that in mountain warfare the delays which artillery causes need not
increase the likelihood of the invaders’ being attacked. It was commonly
believed then, and later, that they must. Twenty-five years after the Nepal
War, Sir Jasper Nicolls sent a body of infantry to force the Khyber pass
without guns, arguing that they would delay the column and increase its
exposure to fire. Yet if there was one precept for which military theorists were
beholden to Ochterlony it was that in mountain war such delay was no
liability, because the invader can partake of his adversary’s principal
advantage—inaccessibility. By adopting the mode of defending
advantageous ground with stockades—an expedient entirely novel in the
Bengal army—he had virtually eliminated the risk of counter-attack. Only
twice during the whole campaign had detachments of his army had to sustain
a major offensive while waiting to bring guns into play——at Tibu and at
Dionthal—and on both occasions they had been saved by a combination of
natural and artificial defences.
On the occasion of the Gurkhas’ defeat, ‘a prominent native’ is reported
to have remarked to a Bengal staff officer: ‘Of what use is it to fight with the
English? Beaten or successful, they are always conquerors !' 158
It is easy to see what he meant. It had not been granted to any of the
British divisions to deserve success; but they had nevertheless won, because
it had been in the power of Ochterlony’s guns to command it.
THE CONQUEST OF KUMAUN
ASTINGS'S original strategy included an attack on Kumaun. He
appreciated that its position on the west bank of the Kali river would made
Hthis province a foothold and base for any reinforcements which Kathmandu
might send to the western theatre of the war, and the incentive to invade it
was the more especially strong as it promised to succumb very easily. The
number of troops in Almora, the capital, was estimated by reliable informants
as between 300 and 600 only; and the disaffection of Brahma Shah, the
Gurkha governor, was well known at Headquarters. Francis Hamilton, Hyder
158
Quoted in the Asiatic Journal for May 1816, p.428.
202
Hearsey and William Fraser were all of the opinion that he would forswear his
allegiance to the Thapa government of Kathmandu if sufficient inducement
was offered. It was therefore determined that while Hyder Hearsey was busy
raising the crops of irregulars which was to help effect military occupation of
the province, overtures should be made with a view to encouraging the
Gurkha to apostatize. He was to be offered a jagir (estate) under the
protection of the Company-possibly in the Gurkha province of Doti, on the
eastern bank of the Kali, of which his brother, Hasti Dal, was at present
governor.
Thomas Rutherfurd, the Assistant-Surgeon at Moradabad, who had
extensive interests in Kumaun hemp, rather fancied himself as a diplomat.
Without any authorization from the government, he sent as agent to Brahma
Shah and invited him to join the British cause. Rutherfurd's efforts were not
appreciated at Headquarters. Much to his disappointment, he was scolded for
meddling and told that it was not the Governor-General's intention to appoint
him Political Agent for the affairs of Kumaun. Hastings, deeming it 'advisable
that the conduct of this important branch of our measures should be vested in
an individual of more approved talents, judgement, and political experience',
selected the Honorable Edward Gardner159 for the post. Gardner was William
Fraser's fellow Assistant at the Delhi Residency. Like his colleague, he
permitted himself eccentricities. In common with Hindu and Muslim society,
he wore immense whiskers and abjured pork and beef; but his equable
temperament and courtly manners made him better suited to diplomacy than
was Fraser. He had a flair for oriental languages, and had qualified with
distinction in Persian and Hindustani at the College of Fort William in 1802.
Reaching Moradabad in the middle of November 1814, Gardner made his
own soundings and discovered fewer encouraging signs than he had been
led to expect. Brahma Shah's enigmatic reception of Ruther-furd's agent had,
it was true, evinced a certain indecision; but other intelligence represented
the Governor to be raising troops and making preparations for resistance.
Gardner was personally inclined to discredit reports of the Gurkha's infirm
loyalty, but he suggested that it was possible that the presence of Amar
Singh Thapa's officers was preventing him from of military demonstration be
made at once against Kumaun, as a means of provoking Brahma Shah into
disclosing his true sympathies.
Not Gardiner, as given in the D.N.B. (s.v. William Linnaeus Gardner). Edward Gardner was a brother of
Alan,2nd Baron Gardner-see Lady Nugent's Journal, ii, pp. 6,9.
159
203
But the calamities in Garhwal meant that all available regular troops
were now occupied, and Hastings did not at this stage contemplate sending
irregulars alone into Kumaun. Early in December, however, his tour of the
upper provinces brought him to Moradabed, and Gardner, who was very
keen to satisfy the expectations of military assistance which had been
aroused among the recalcitrant inhabitants of Kumaun, was able to exert
direct persuasion on members of the Governor-General's suite-especially on
John Adam, the Political Secretary, who was a personal friend. Perhaps even
more decisive was the presence at Moradabad of Lieutenant-Colonel William
Gardner, Edward's cousin. This was a remarkable character. Beginning his
military career in the King's service, he had served under Hastings (then the
Earl of Moira) at Quiberon, in 1795. Some time afterwards he had quitted the
King's army in order to try his fortune as a freelance in Indial. He had entered
the service of Holkar, the Maratha prince of Indore, and when on a mission to
Cambay had sought and obtained the hand of the thirteen-year-old Begam,
thereby becoming brother-in-law to Hyder Hearsey. After a quarrel with
Holkar, in which he made to cut the Maratha down, he had fled from Indore
and taken service with Amrit Rao, adoptive brothe of the Peshwa of Poona.
Gardner made a spectacular escape from the clutches of this prince in 1804,
when he clambered down a fifty-foot precipice, swam a river in full flood and
disguised himself as a grass-cutter in order to join Lord Lake. He had been in
the Company's employ ever since, latterly as the commander of the crops of
irregular horse which bore his name, though he was only a pensioner and his
rank was purely nominal, or local.
William Gardner was in very easy circumstances in 1814, enjoying, by
special dispensation, possession of the considerable estate near Agra which
had been bestowed on his wife by the Emperor of Delhi; and he had no
material object to seek in the command of an expedition into Kumaun. But he
was still only in his early forties, and had far from exhausted his
superabundant energy. Hastings, for his part, admired the experiences and
expertise of the eighty or so ex-Maratha officers now on Company pensions,
and respected the patriotic motives which had induced them to forsake
positions of great power and remuneration and join the British in 1804. He
was always pleased to grant them some favour in return. It was no doubt this
disposition, together with characteristic feelings of generosity towards an old
fellow campaigner, which caused him to change his mind and consent to a
'hazardous' military expedition, which was cast more in the old Maratha then
204
the modern Company mould. Gardner, assisted by such of the ex-Maratha
officers as appeared eligible, was permitted to raise a corps of 3,000 irregular
infantry from Rohilkhand. This, together with Hearsey's corps, was to
commence the invasion of Kumanu, pending the availability of a supporting
force of regulars. Gardner was to be furnished with a couple of six-pounder
field guns, a few elephants and Mr. Rutherfurd as chief medical officer,
commissary, postmaster, chief of intelligence and general factotum.
Hastings was right to describe it as a 'hazardous effort'. The marital
populace of Rohilkhand consisted of Afghan immigrants, mostly of Pathan
extraction, who, although individually intrepid, were instinctively cavalry rather
than infantry soldiers, were not susceptible to discipline and unlike Hindus,
were not renowned for loyalty to their salt.
There was no shortage of volunteers. Both Gardner and Hearsey
recruited in the neighbourhood of Rampur, the estate of a semi-independent
Muslim nawab, whose capital was the resort of the thousands of Pathans
who came down from Afghanistan every year in search of employment as
mercenaries. By the beginning of January 1815 Gardner had collected 1,600
men. Soon after, he was joined by the body of Pathans who had taken
service with the Gurkhas at the outbreak of the war, and these swelled his
corps to a number in excess of its permitted limit. The 500 surplus troops
were put at the disposal of the exiled Raja of Doti, who, it was decided,
should be encouraged to make a diversion into his old territories. This would
prevent Hasti Dal from crossing the Kali and going to the assistance of his
brother in Kumaun. As an extra insurance against this eventuality, it was
arranged that Hearsey’s force should move up the western bank of the Kali
and secure the ghats. Harak Deva Joshi arrived at Gardner’s headquarters at
Kashipur early in January. At the invitation of Edward Gardner, who was
struck by his intelligence and persuaded that his local knowledge and
influence could be turned to good account, he agreed to accompany the
expedition.
Gardner left Kashipur on 11 February, after having been delayed first
by lack of porters and then by tempestuous weather. His advance to Almora,
over snow-covered hills and through dark and dripping deodar forests, was
arduous, but largely uneventful. Always remembering that the morale of a
force such as his could not survive the shock of a defeat, his constant
concern was to avoid direct confrontation with the enemy and proceed by
205
outwitting rather than by thrashing them. Never did he take unnecessary risks
for the sake of personal glory. He constantly (though unsuccessfully) urged
Hearsey to attack Almora from the east while his own activities distracted
Brahma Shah’s attentions to the west, and did not covet that opportunity for
himself.
The main trade route to Almora from the plains followed the Kosila
river, which approaches Almora from the south-west. In order to confound the
enemy, Gardner decided to take a longer and much more difficult subsidiary
path, which stretched across country by way of Ranilchet and Ryuni and
approached Almora from the north-west. As soon as he learnt of the direction
of his march, Brahma Shah sent about 1,500 men, almost the whole of his
force, to oppose Gardner at Ranikhet. This is a small shrine, situated at the
northern end of a long mountainous ridge which rises some 6,000 feet above
the sea and stretches like a natural barrier across the western approaches to
Almora. Gardner deftly foiled this attempt by sending a lightly equipped
detachment, comprising almost half his force and led by Mohan Singh, a
native officer of his own corps of horse, to turn the southern end of the ridge
and occupy a summit called Sihayi Devi, which lies between Ranikhet and
Almora. Fearful of being cut off, the Nepalis abandoned their positions on the
ridge and hurried back to Almora, leaving the northern route open again.
Despite assurances to the contrary from the guides, this path proved too
difficult for the elephants. Gardner had to leave them and have the guns
dragged by teams of hillmen from Rutherfurd’s commissariat establishment.
‘the force left Ranikhet on 25 March, and took until late on the 29th to cover
the sixteen-odd mites to Katarmal. This is a hill on the western bank of the
Kosila, almost facing Almora, which is on the eastern bank. It was occupied
by an enemy force when Gardner approached, but they decamped during the
night of 28 March.
Having secured a position whence he could effectively impede all
Brahma Shah’s contacts with the west, Gardner was content to beleaguer
Almora until the regulars came. His magnanimity was appreciated at
Headquarters, and Hastings commended him for ‘so generously spurning the
temptation of assaulting the city before Colonel Nicolls should come up, and
availing himself (though at the hazard of the public interest) of what might
have proved a brilliant opportunity for himself’. Before long there was
evidence to show that his blockade, in which the local landholders and
peasants enthusiastically co-operated, was very effective. Spies, deserters
206
and intercepted correspondence all told the same story. The Nepali troops
were without pay and so straitened for provisions that they were having to
plunder the adjacent villages. Most of its civilian inhabitants had abandoned
the town—in response to Brahma Shah’s orders, according to one report.
The main source of disquiet at the British headquarters was the various
rumours to the effect that Brahrna Shah’s second brother, Hasti Dal Shah,
had crossed the Kati and was on his way to Almora with a large additional
reinforcement. At first there was little fear that he would be able in any event
to reach the capital, because Hearsey was known to be operating in eastern
or Kali Kumaun with the express purpose of preventing such a juncture; but
on the night of 5 April a feu de joie was fired from a fort on the Almora ridge,
which informants said was in celebration of a victory gained by Hasti Dal over
Hearsey on a April. The worst fears were confirmed the next day, when
Edward Gardner received the following note from Brahma Shah:
You will have been informed that my brother Hasti Dal, being on his match
hither from Doti, met me on the road after crossing the Kali, with Mr Hyder
Heatsey who, having opposed and engaged him, was wounded and made
prisoner. My brother has sent for surgeons to attend him; and Mr Hearsey
having observed that his own medicines were best suited for the cure of his
wounds, my brother has sent for his private servants and his own medicines,
and has kept him comfortably accommodated near himself. Hyder Hearsey’s
background was similar to Gardner’s, but he had nothing like the same ability
and modesty as a commander. Among other functions, he had fulfilled that of
lieutenant to George Thomas, the Irish adventurer who was for some years at
the end of the eighteenth century the ruler of his own private empire in
Sirhind. It had been largely owing to Hearsey’s bad judgement that Thomas’s
army, of which he was in effective command while Thomas himself ‘was
prostrate from the effects of alcohol, was defeated by the forces of his rival
Perron at Georgegarh in 1801. He was very flamboyant, and struck people as
boorish. ‘Very ingenious, but uneducated’ was Lady Nugent’s opinion. Lie
made no secret of the contempt in which he held the Gurkha army. Hearsey
had had three months in which to raise and train his corps, as opposed to
Gardner’s one; but even with this advantage, he was unable to draw from his
men a performance that bore comparison to that given by the force under his
brother-in-law.
207
He was instructed to force the Timla pass, which led into eastern
Kumaun from just north of Pilibhit, and then secure possession of the ghats
on the Kali, so as to prevent Hasti Dat’s crossing the river from Doti. But from
motives of vanity, of revenge against the Gurkhas for the rough treatment he
had suffered with Moorcroft in Garhwal in 1812 and, no doubt, of inspiring in
government a gratitude which would cause it to favour his claim to Dehra
Dun, Hearsey privately made up his mind to widen his operations and win
greater eclat. Instead of devoting his resources to guarding the river ghats,
the function for which they were intended, he undertook the siege of forts in
the interior as well, thereby frittering away his troops and making them
insufficient for either purpose. He paid no heed to Gardner’s anxious
dispatches, which stressed that the securing of the Kali ghats was his
essential object, and after occupying Champawat, the old capital of Kumaun,
he turned his main attentions to besieging Katalgarh. It was a senseless
undertaking. Katalgarh, five or six miles to the north, was the strongest
fortress in Kumaun. Its position precluded its being completely surrounded,
while Hearsey had few men and not a single gun.
At the beginning of March, the greater part of Hearsey’s force was
distributed between Brahmadeo, at the foot of the Timla pass, the forts at the
top of the pass, Champawat and Katalargh. I-Ic spared only the remainder,
amounting to hardly 300 men, to guard the river ghats. Ignoring all directions
to divert his own troops for the purpose, he asked government to organize a
separate incursion into Doti in order to contain Hasti Dal.
On 31 March, intelligence was received by Hearsey, then at
Champawat, that 500 of the enemy had crossed the Kali about fourteen miles
upstream and, harassed by a body of local troops, was attempting to make a
stockade on the western bank. His guide, knowing that this part of the
country was the stronghold of the Phartiyal faction, propitiated by Brahma
Shah and implacably opposed to Harak Deva Joshi, warned the Captain that
this was probably a ruse and advised him not to engage the force. But
Hearsey fancied he knew better, and in a fit of irritation sent the guide to
Katalgarh in order to be rid of him. Lie marched that night with 270 men, and
reached the scene of action the next morning. Judging that the enemy could
not be driven back without a reinforcement, he sent to Katalgarh for 400 extra
troops. That evening the scorned guide’s warning was only too well
vindicated. It was learnt that at three o’clock in the afternoon Hasti Dal had
taken advantage of Hearsey’s preoccupation to cross the river below the
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scene of the engagement with a force reported to be 1,500 strong. Hearsey
at once marched his force south again, in a desperate bid to intercept the wily
Gurkha. Plot with haste, tired, and thirsty, and with no ammunition save that
which they had in pouch, they finally accosted the enemy early on 2 April at
Khilpati, about five miles north east of Champawat. The battle was fierce, and
Hearsey’s men had soon expended all their cartridges. The Captain was
severely wounded in the thigh, and when he fell alt his men fled. Most were
cut to shreds by pursuing Nepaiis. It is a tradition in the Hearsey family that
Hyder would have been decapitated as he lay on the field, had it not been for
the timely intervention of Hasti Dal. The two men were not strangers.
Hearsey had met Hasti Dal when on an official expedition, whose purpose
was to survey the upper reaches of the Ganges, in 1808. According to the
family story, that encounter had been the occasion of his saving the Gurkha
from being killed by a wild bear. Hasti flat now recognized his deliverer and
repaid his debt of gratitude.
In view of Hearsey’s failure, it was lucky that a reinforcement of regular
troops was already on its way to join Gardner. In Hastings’s view, the
collapse of the British offensive in the eastern theatre had made the
possession of Kumaun indispensable. Once the Gurkhas had been relieved
of the threat of an attack on Kathmandu, it was essential to prevent their
diverting their unexpectedly available reserves of manpower to bolster the
defensive in the west. Acting on this conviction, Hastings had, early in March,
requested Lieutenant-Colonel Nicolls, a King’s officer of the 14th Foot, to
prepare for active service. The force which could be put at his disposal was
very modest. It consisted of two battalions of native infantry, a detachment
consisting of flank (grenadier and light) companies from Dehra Dun, four sixpounders, two small mortars and a few pieces of heavy artillery. According to
paper estimates, the strength of the infantry was 2,035 men; but these took
no account of men sick and ‘on command’ (detached on extra-regimental
duties), and the number which actually took the field with Nicolls did not
exceed about 1,300. Of these, only thirty artillerists were European.
Nicolls wasted no time at Moradabad, his rendezvous. His force was
barely half-assembled by the end of March, and no word had been received
from Captain Leys, commanding the detachment from Dehra Dun.
Nevertheless, the Colonel marched on the 29th with two six-pounders and a
vanguard of three companies, leaving the remaining segments of his column,
with the rest of the ordnance and the elephants, to make their own way into
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the hills. There had been no time to acquire and distribute greatcoats, long
pantatoons or tents, and the men were going to have to improvise protection
against the cold with their kamals (blankets). It had been impossible to collect
an adequate number of hill porters, and the arrangement had to be made
whereby all spare provisions and supplies were left in a depot at Dhikuli. It
was hoped that porters sufficient for moving these forward would be enlisted
later. Meanwhile the sepoys had to carry their own equipment and five days’
provisions, which together weighed little less than eighty pounds. Nicolls had
had to choose between two evils—delay or a deficient commissariat; and
although he had decided that the former was the greater, he never lost sight
of the insufficiencies he had been unable to remedy before marching.
Although spring was well advanced, the weather remained capricious in the
hills and there were periods of heavy rain. Anxious to provide against the
worst discomforts of these and of the monsoon season proper, which was
expected in a few weeks, the Colonel asked for greatcoats and pantaloons
for the men, which the Adjutant-General promised would be provided. News
of the defeat of Hearsey’s detachment made Nicolls fear that the local
populace might cease to provide victuals should his own column suffer any
mishap, and he made an urgent request to the Magistrate of Moradabad for
1,000 bearers, to bring up supplies from the depot.
The Magistrate, Mr. Oldham, had to impress men for the service,
paying them an advance of one rupee in return for a promise not to run away
for twenty-five days. Needless to say, most of them pocketed their rupees
and absconded even before they had reached Dhikuli. The lack of means of
bringing forward his provisions remained a major problem for Nicolls
throughout the campaign.
He reached the camp before Almora with the advance on 9 April, and
the other sections of his force, including the artillery, arrived at various
intervals over the next ten days. The new arrivals, who, with camp followers,
numbered more than 3,000 souls, had soon consumed available stores of
grain, and poor Rutherfurd was at his wits’ end to feed the army. One
observer wrote that ‘not unfrequently the men, after toiling all day over the
hills, had no better evening fare awaiting them than a few ears of wheat,
which happened to be ripe, gathered in the fields, [and] roasted over a fire.’160
160
E.I.U.S….., vol. iii, 1834, p. 249.
210
Jasper Nicolls, who was only thirty-seven, was an officer who had
partaken to the full of the opportunities for military experience available
during the years of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He had served
with distinction in the West Indies, in the Peninsular, in Hanover and at
Buenos Aires, and had returned for a second spell in India in 1813, when he
assumed the staff appointment of Quartermaster-General to the King’s
Troops. Lean, dark-eyed and prematurely balding, he was, unless roused, a
man of tact and delicacy of feeling. He was at great pains to spare Gardner
any sense of embarrassment at having been superseded, and treated him in
all things as an equal. But he had no sympathy for the errant Hearsey. ‘I have
never approved of Captain Hearsey’s grand views and great extension of his
force’, he grumbled to the Adjutant-General on receiving news of the calamity
in eastern Kumaun; ‘but I arrived too late to confine his exertions.’ He did not
estimate the consequences of the defeat lightly. ‘We may fairly suppose that
the enemy’s defence of the capital will [now] be greatly prolonged’, he told
the Magistrate of Moradabad. For his own part, Hearsey detested Nicolls until
the end of his life, and ever afterwards insisted on disparaging his
achievement in Kumaun.
On the evening of 12 April, guns were fired from Almora in salute.
There was no doubt in the British camp that this signalled the arrival of the
triumphant Hasti Dal with his prisoner. Intelligence reports represented his
force to be no greater than 300 to 400, of whom only between 125 and 175
had matchlocks. This suggests either that Hasti Dal had left the greater part
of his men in Kali Kumaun, which seems unlikely, or that estimates in
Hearsey’s camp had been wildly exaggerated. Informants from the fort
assured Gardner that the total force at Brahma Shah’s disposal did not
exceed 2,000 men, and that they were all ‘distressed for want of provisions
and rather down in the mouth, the few remaining inhabitants running off for
want of food’.
On April 22, when his column, including the two iron twelve-pounders
and the two eight-inch mortars by which he set great store, was at last
complete and when he was waiting only to improve his stock of provisions,
Nicolls heard from Rutherfurd that Hasti Dal had left the ridge before Almora
with 200 or 300 men, and was making for Gananath. This was a mountain
about fifteen miles north of Almora, between the Kosila and the Kali. The
Colonel, knowing that Rutherfurd’s intelligence was not always reliable,
doubted that the Gurkha could in fact have made such a rash move; but
211
subsequent information confirmed the news, and Nicolls could only assume
that Hasti Dal had gone to meet the ammunition and treasure expected from
the west. In fact, as was afterwards learnt, his only concern was to retain
possession of the northern perganas of Kumaun, in order to safeguard
communications with Kathmandu.
Nicolls acted quickly. At midnight, Major Patton was sent in pursuit with
ten companies of infantry, a company of irregulars and a day’s supply of
victuals. After a hot and thirsty march, he caught up with his prey on a
conifer-clad ridge near Gananath and, at the cost of only two of his own men
killed and twenty-six wounded, took about eighty enemy lives. Hasti Dal’s
was among them. He was shot through the temple and died on the way back
to Almora.
Although his provisions were still seriously inadequate, Nicolls decided
that he must take the tide at the flood, and attack Almora before the enemy
had time to recover from the shock of this reverse.
Almora was a small town by European standards, but ranked as
considerable in the north Indian hills. It stretched for about three-quarters of a
mile along the crest of a mountain ridge, in a northwest—south-east direction.
There was one main street, naturally paved with slaty rock and lined with
houses. These had open ground floors of whitewashed stone, fitted out as
shops, and wooden upper storeys. There were two citadels. One, Fort
Almora, was in the centre of the ridge. The other, then called Lal Mandi, but
late’ renamed Fort Moira in honour of the Governor-General, was at its
southern extremity. They were not impressive, being little more than glorified
circular sangars, constructed of unhewn stones embedded in clay. Their
walls were not above about eight feet in height, but the scarped knolls on
which they stood increased their elevation considerably. A narrow col ran to
the west, connecting the Almora ridge with a parallel range, which rose from
the eastern bank of the Kosila. This range formed a natural bulwark against
attack from west of the river, and was sprinkled with stone breast-works. The
most considerable of these was at the northern extremity on the pinnacle
called Sitoli. It formed Brahma Shah’s principal outpost, and seemed almost
immune to attack. The ground fell steeply from its walls, and a mountain
slightly to the north, called Kahimath, overlooked the position and
commanded the approaches to it. In general aspect, the landscape here was
rather bleak. The highest reaches of the mountains were then devoid of
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trees, and their stony sides were cut into terraces to make more room for
cultivation.
The five flank companies under Captain Leys returned from Gananath
at nine o’clock on the morning of 25 April, and four hours later Nicolls
launched an attack against the enemy outposts on the Sitoli range. He
marched in person at the head of the flank companies and the 1st/4th Native
Infantry, with the aim of establishing a position on the northern end of the
range and expelling the Nepalis with mortar fire. Gardner advanced with the
irregulars on a parallel line to his right, directing his effort against the
defences on the southern part of the range. Those who remained in camp at
Katarmal watched the columns march down together, and found it a stirring
spectacle.
But the road was rough and narrow, and made it impossible for the
columns to remain compact. As soon as he had crossed the Kosila, here a
small mountain stream with deep pools and fordable shallows, and reached a
small level spot on its eastern bank, Nicolls halted for about half an hour to
allow the men to collect and to re-form his column. He asked his two artillery
officers to give the enemy a few shells. A howitzer was unloaded and
mounted within five minutes; but appearances were deceptive, and the
enemy breastworks were found to be much too distant for the shells to have
any effect. Then came the order ‘Move on!’, and the long climb up the flank of
the Sitoli range began. It took two hours to reach the crest. As Nicolls’s
troops got nearer, a gun opened on them from the breastwork most
immediately above, but the hill was too steep for it to bear with any accuracy.
By comparing their height with that of some enemy soldiers who had earlier
been standing outside them, Nicolls had been able to ascertain that the
breast-works rose no more than four or five feet above the ground. This fact,
and the eagerness of his men, determined him not to wait for the mortars, but
to take the positions by coups tie main. Appreciating that the flank companies
must be tired after their recent exertions, he put the 1st/4th Native Infantry in
front. Led by Lieutenant Wight, one group of four subalterns and some
sepoys with fixed bayonets dashed at the first breastwork. It was about four
feet wide, with an embrasure in the centre, cut to within about two feet of the
ground. As the barrel of the enemy gun obstructed this, only one person
could enter at a time. Wight was first in. He was immediately cut down, and
lay dangerously wounded; but another officer, clambering after, saved him by
felling his adversary with a swingeing blow. The Nepalis were overpowered
213
within three minutes. Abandoning the gun, they left their position by the rear,
which was open, and fled down the opposite side of the ridge.
The two breastworks to the left were carried almost simultaneously. His
bravery in one of these encounters earned a sepoy named Dokal Singh
special mention in Detachment Orders as ‘a hero, who, though wounded in
five places, refused, when lying disabled on the ground, to surrender his
musket to several of the enemy, who would have wrested it from his hands’.
The flank companies, under Leys, now reaching the crest of the ridge, Nicolls
directed them to pursue the ejected enemy. They promptly divided, and
hounded them by five different routes down the eastern side of the range.
Meanwhile the 1st/4th easily ousted the occupants from the four or five
breastworks to the north, including that on Sitoli mount itself. The enemy post
on Kalimath was thus completely cut off from Almora. Gardner’s men seized
the three breastworks on the southern end of the crest at about the same
time.
This was the first time that Nicolls had commanded native troops in
action, and their bravery had made the occasion unforgettable for him. 'I
congratulate His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief', he wrote to
Headquarters, ‘on the glorious result of the noble exertions of the troops,
whom it will be a source of pride to me, to the end of my life, to have
commanded’. More than anything else, the behaviour of the sepoys on this
occasion demonstrated the decisive influence of the presence of an adequate
number of European officers. Because the column had been disorganized by
the badness of the road, almost all the officers were in front when the
engagement began, and there were five subalterns with the party which
attacked the first breastwork alone.
The Sitoli range once secured, an advance party was pushed across
the connecting col to the northern end of Ahmora ridge. Headquarters were
established in a quadrangular fort, about sixty yards square, which had been
abandoned by the enemy.161 About 250 men of the 1st/4th and flank
companies were then sent southwards into the town itself? They occupied a
pagoda, called Dip Chand temple, and set up two howitzers on its terrace.
The first shells were fired at about six o’clock. They were aimed at Fort
Almora, which was 300 yards farther south, beyond the Raja’s palace.
161
Later called St. Mark’s Tower.
214
Meanwhile, all was quiet on the Sitohi range. Then, at about eleven
o’clock, the Nepahis still at Kalimnath attacked Lieutenant Costley and the
eighty sepoys on Sitoli mount. A local story is that they covered their advance
with a drove of cattle carrying firebrands on their horns. Nicolls immediately
sent a reinforcement of about 150 sepoys under Lieutenants Browne and
Whinflehd to aid the overwhelmed party. Gardner, who was with Nicolls at
headquarters, volunteered to go with them, taking Mohan Singh and a
company of irregulars. The reinforcement met Costley and his men at the foot
of Sitoli mount, fleeing before the Nepali onslaught. Browne, Whinfield and
Gardner then drove the enemy at bayonet point back up the bill. So ferocious
was their offensive, in which they did not fire a shot, that Sitoli had been
retaken in ten minutes. But the Nepalis would not concede defeat, and
contested the post stubbornly throughout the night. The British officers and
their native troops, with equal pertinacity, refused to yield, and three charges
were repulsed. The valour of Browne and Mohan Singli was especially
conspicuous. In honour of the former, the hill was later named Mount
Browne; and the latter was presented with the sword which Hastings had
entrusted to Nicolls with the instruction that it was to be given to the sirdar of
Gardner’s levy who proved himself most worthy. ‘He headed three
successive and successful charges of the Pathan levies’, ran his citation,
‘and taught the Gurkha chiefs that at night, their favourite hour of conflict, and
with the sword, their favourite weapon, they were unequal to face our gallant
troops with any hope of success’.
The noise of battle from Sitoli acted as a summons to the enemy in Fort
Almora, who attempted to dislodge the advanced post and battery at Dip
Chand temple. They made a sortie and sprinted tip the main street of the
town. The wall of the temple enclosure was only five or six feet high. This
they lobbed stones over, with leather slings, and tried to vault. Several were
shot or bayonetted on the wall, and one was killed actually inside the
enclosure. The rest were beaten off. Work meanwhile continued on the
placing of eight-inch mortars, and these opened on the fort about midnight.
The night was murky, and it was impossible to distinguish objects even
at ten yards’ distance. Throughout, the repetitive crepitation and orange
flashing of musketry continued, and there was incessant skirmishing, which
added considerably to the casualties on both sides. It was reckoned that
many of Nicolls’s losses were caused by his own men, firing blindly. Early in
the morning of 25 April, Lieutenant Tapley, at Dip Chand temple, lost his life.
215
Each time an enemy party had been repulsed, he insisted on going outside
the wall of the enclosure ‘to watch when they were coming again’. Lieutenant
Field, commanding the post, repeatedly urged him not to expose himself so
needlessly; but his warnings were ignored, and about two o’clock Tapley was
shot by a musketeer in one of the houses which overlooked the temple.
Mental strain and hunger made the night seem interminable. Nicolls
was restless with worry; but when at last the hills were streaked with light, all
his positions were still secure, and the Nepalis slunk back into their lairs. The
British commander’s first concern now was for the comfort of his men.
Remembering that they had not eaten for twenty-four hours, he mustered a
group of his own servants and some coolies, and personally visited each post
with bread and butter and bottles of warm tea for the officers, and gram and
sweetmeats for the sepoys. As he spoke little Hindustani he asked Lieutenant
Hay to tell the men how pleased lie was with them. Needless to say, Jasper
Nicolls was ever afterwards a favourite of the Bengal army.
At about half-past eight, when extra cartridges had arrived from
Katarmal, operations were resumed. Field was directed to take his party from
the temple down the main street of the town and seize the palace, which
intervened between his present position and Fort Almora. It was a spacious,
square, upper-storeyed building, surrounded by an eight-foot stone wall. The
Nepalis in the place peppered his men with bullets, but they vaulted the wall,
entered the building and ran up the main staircase. Eight or ten of the enemy
were shot or bayoneted; the rest fled down a back staircase and escaped to
the fort. Field waved his cap as a signal and Bell and Wilson of the artillery
brought down a couple of six-pounders. They knocked embrasures in the
rear wall of the palace compound, which was only about seventy yards from
the fort, and set up a battery.
Meanwhile, the mortars at Dip Chand temple had continued to fire, and
despite the great distance, several shells landed in the fort. Soon large
numbers of the enemy were seen leaving the place by a door in the eastern
wall and making for Lal Mandi fort behind. Nicolls ordered Lieutenants Field
and McGregor to try to enter while the enemy were coming out. The two
officers took a small party of sepoys and ran up the side street which led to
the entrance; but on reaching it they found that the enemy had been leaving
through a wicket, which was slammed shut as they approached. They could
216
not force it open and, being showered with stones and shot from the walls of
the fort, were compelled to withdraw.
The contest, however, was all but over. Brahma Shah had neither
enthusiasm nor energy for further defiance. He had never understood the
expediency of the war; and now that his troops were hungry, unpaid and
increasingly disgruntled, he saw no merit in prolonging it by futile selfimmolation. Having made as honourable a resistance as his means
permitted, he resolved, in consultation with his chief officers, that it was his
duty to end the contest on the most favourable terms that he could get. At the
end of March, Edward Gardner had offered him and his men a safe conduct
to the eastern bank of the Kali in return for the surrender of the capital. At
nine o’clock on 26 April, he sent a note to the Political Agent, under a flag of
truce, requesting a suspension of hostilities on the same terms. Nicolls and
Edward Gardner had no inclination to flaunt their victory by demanding stiffer
terms, and William Gardner was sent to meet Brahma Shah and negotiate
the surrender. There was some delay before a convention was signed, owing
to the Gurkha’s insistence that the troops originally intended for Amar Singh
Thapa’s army in the west should be allowed to continue their journey; but
finally, on 27 April, realizing that the Colonel was adamant in his refusal, he
gave up this condition and agreed to release Hearsey and withdraw with all
his men to the eastern bank of the Rail within ten days. On the 28th, Nicolls
and Edward Gardner paid Brahma Shah a visit, and the reasons behind his
concession became clear. He wanted to retain control of negotiations for a
general peace, and had ‘projects of inducing the British Government to assist
the Raja’s party in regaining their power and overturning that of the Thapas’.
Gardner felt bound to decline discussing such issues at this stage; but he
found it impossible not to feel considerable sympathy for this tall, stout,
affable Gurkha, whose looks belied his seventy years, whose nervous
speech impediment somehow removed all doubts concerning his sincerity,
and whose competent Hindustani made it possible to address him with
reasonable ease and informality.
On the night of 31 April, Brahma Shah quitted Almora, taking with him
such of his army as had remained loyal. This must have included the great
majority of his regular troops, because only the irregular Kumauni soldiers
had taken service with the British—and even they did not number more than
about 300.
217
As the news of the surrender of the capital spread through Rumaun,
the other Gurkha garrisons scattered throughout the province spontaneously
capitulated. Edward Gardner thereupon declared the territory annexed to the
dominions of the East India Company, and assumed the functions of civil
administrator. The cost of the acquisition had not been great. British
casualties during the operations of 25 and 26 April did not exceed 50 killed
and 161 wounded; and the total of casualties for the whole campaign was not
greatly in excess of those figures.
Nicolls attributed his success to ‘the daily miracle of feeding the troops
in such a poor country’ and to ‘the efficient service of our eight-inch mortars’,
which ‘considerably hastened’ the fall of Almora. The latter conviction
confirmed Ochterlony’s experience of the necessity of heavy artillery in
mountain warfare and makes it all the more surprising that Nicolls, when
Commander-in-Chief, sent a column to the Khyber Pass without guns. ‘The
response of the sepoys under his command appears to have been far more
impressive than that of those under the other commanders of the war,
Ochterlony included; but it must be remembered that the Kumaun
detachment had been in the hills for barely a month when its first and only
major engagement took place—a month, moreover, in which the weather had
been at its kindest. The other two divisions in the western theatre had had to
endure all the rigours of a mountain winter.
Considering their notoriety, and the circumstances under which they
had been raised, the performance of Gardner’s corps of Pathans had been
nothing less than remarkable. More than anything else, this had been a
testimony to the talent and personality of the man who commanded them. He
had transformed untamed brigands into disciplined, tractable and steadfast
soldiers. No one else could handle them. No sooner had Gardner returned to
the plains than the Pathans, left in the hills to garrison the various acquired
strongholds, again reverted to an unruly rabble. They deserted in droves,
helping themselves to Rutherfurd’s stores of grain and terrorizing local
villages. Nicolls fully appreciated the measure of Gardner’s contribution to the
success of the campaign. With characteristic generosity, he made his
acknowledgement the subject of a separate dispatch to Headquarters; and
on his recommendation Gardner’s monthly pension was raised from 300 to
1,000 rupees.
218
INTERLUDE
URING the hot and monsoon seasons of 1815, the troops acting in the
eastern theatre had the unenviable task of defending the frontier of the
Dnewly acquired territory in the Tarai and the Morang. Time hung heavy on
their hands, because the Nepalis knew better than to enter the region at this
deathly period of the year; but casualties in these divisions were nevertheless
greater than they had been during the whole period of active operations. The
prevalent symptoms—violent fever and delirium— indicate that the principal
malady was malaria; but its effects were complicated by all the various
disorders caused by primitive sanitation, contaminated drinking water and the
well-intended but horrifyingly unscientific antics of contemporary surgeons.
John Wood’s division was distributed between three posts on the border of
Gorakhpur. By the middle of May more than 1,200 men were sick, and had
had to be withdrawn. There being no hospital in Gorakhpur town, they were
lodged in the bullock sheds, which can hardly have hastened their recovery.
H.M. 24th Foot was the only European regiment on the frontier, the others
having been remanded to cantonments. They were posted at Amowa, just
south of Segauli. 135 men out of 751 were seriously ill in June, and between
the end of March and the beginning of September sixty died. At Nathpur,
farther east, Colonel Gregory was in charge of some2,500 native infantry. In
the middle of August his force was in a dreadful sickly state’. ‘In less than a
month’, he wrote, ‘I lost four European officers; nearly 300 men are absent on
sick certificate, and an equal number are now in the hospital; and the men
who have recovered from the Tarai fever have not yet regained their strcngth,
and are perfectly useless . . . added to which I have only one medical man in
charge of the sick of two and a half battalions.’ This last fact may have been
less a liability than he thought.
While the troops suffered, the diplomats talked. Serious negotiations
began at the end of May, and lasted until the end of the year. During the
latter half of his tour of the upper provinces, and in the first months after his
return to Calcutta in October, hardly a week passed without the GovernorGeneral’s receiving a formidably bulky dispatch concerning peace
discussions, and without his dictating an equally elaborate one in reply.
A few days after Brahma Shah had crossed the Rail and entered Doti,
he was joined by his surviving brother, Rudra Vir, who was governor of
Sallyana province, beyond Doti to the east. William Gardner, who had
219
escorted the garrison of Almora to the river, met Rudra Vir and had a long
informal conversation with him. During the course of this, it became clear that
great political significance attached to the selection of a Nepalese negotiator.
The Gurkha assured Gardner that ‘whoever was charged with arranging a
treaty with the British Government would hereafter have the greatest weight
in the Nepal councils.’
There were three contenders for the commission. They were Brahma
Shah; Gajraj Misra, the erstwhile guru of the royal family, who had
approached the Governor-General with an offer to mediate; and Amar Singh
Thapa. Hastings, having no wish to in-crease the political influence of the
last, did not contemplate negotiating through him; but he was prepared to
conclude a treaty with whichever of the two other parties offered the
indemnification he demanded. He reasoned that if either of them was
deputed to treat, it must be with powers to grant all the territorial sacrifices he
required, because the durbar at Kathmandu was not ignorant of their scope.
Bradshaw, in his exchanges with Chandra Sekhar, the captured vakil, and
with Gajraj Misra, had made it known that the Company would insist on
retaining all the lands it had conquered, and would demand a treaty which
guaranteed it compensation for the cost of the war and security from fresh
aggression. If either of the two contenders, therefore, offered less than the
decided price, it could only be in order to increase his own prestige and
influence. It followed that acceptance of a reduced offer would be tantamount
to abetting the ambitions of a particular individual or political party, and such
behaviour was, in Hastings’s view, beneath the dignity of the Company. But
neither of the Nepalese agents understood that this was the British attitude.
As they saw it, the prime purpose of the Company must be not territorial
indemnification, but the establishment of an influence in Kathmandu. This
was why Gajraj Misra emphasized that it was his especial desire to recover
the office of royal guru and exercise it under the protection of a British
Residency; and why Rudra Vir Shah urgently stressed to Gardner that their
securing the peace negotiation would enable his brother and himself to
overthrow the low-caste usurping Thapas, whom he contemptuously referred
to as ‘Khasias’, and re-establish the power of their own party, which had
always been the pro-British one. Neither seems to have taken the British
demand for indemnification in territory seriously at first, and the two governments negotiated at cross purposes for many months.
220
Because he was the first to secure the appropriate authority,
negotiations were begun with Gajraj Misra. Since the palace revolution of
1803, this brahmin had been living in exile at Benares, on the proceeds of a
jagir provided by the Company. Motivated partly by a desire to reingratiate
himself with the durbar and recover his lost position, and partly by a genuine
concern to open the Raja’s eyes to the peril of his situation and save his
kingdom from destruction, he had offered his services as a mediator. Both
governments had welcomed the tender. Hastings had recalled his previous
adherence to the pro-British party in Kathmandu and his efforts to promote
the success of the Kirkpatrick and Knox missions; and the durbar was
anxious to employ an agent who was in favour with the British and able to
inform it of the true nature of the Governor-General’s conditions of peace. In
response to an invitation from the Raja, he had left for Kathmandu early in
May, accompanied by Chandra Sekhar Upadhyaya, whom Bradshaw had
repossessed of his private property in order to foster an auspicious
atmosphere.
Both men returned to Bradshaw’s headquarters at Segauli on 18 May.
Gajraj Misra produced an authorization under the Raja’s red seal, and
declared that he was empowered to accept whatever terms the victors in their
mercy might require. But, confident in his assumption that what the Company
really sought was the institution of himself as guru in Kathmandu, Gajraj had
given the durbar to understand that the price in territory would not, when it
came to the point, be as high as had been threatened; so when Bradshaw
informed him that the Gurkhas were required to relinquish all colonies west of
the Kali and the whole of the Tarai and Morang, he was aghast and
incredulous. He was forced to confess that he had no mandate to accede to
such stringent demands, and asked to be allowed to make further reference
to Kathmandu. Hastings, on the other hand, was disposed to think that he
must have received plenary powers with his commission, and that he was
bargaining well within their limit with a view to improving his personal
standing. He therefore retaliated by ordering a suspension of negotiations in
this quarter and informed Edward Gardner that he might begin discussions
with Brahma Shah.
The Shah brothers were desperately eager to be acknowledged as
negotiators by the British. Brahma had been edgy and nervous ever since his
capitulation, because he dreaded the effects at Kathmandu of Amar Singh
Thapa’s misrepresentations. It had taken all the kindly expostulation of
221
William Gardner to induce him to cross the Kali and enter Nepalese territory
once more. On Edward Gardner’s advice, he had applied to Kathmandu for
authority to treat, and while waiting to know the result of his solicitation had
been in such a state of agitation (earnestly affirming that if he failed to be
appointed negotiator he could expect nothing but death from the despised
‘Khasias’) that William Gardner had been moved to compassion. At his
suggestion, Brahma and his brother were offered the chance to seize the
Gurkha province of Doti and rule it as Company protégés. But they had
declined the invitation, Brahma’s reason being that he could not endanger his
many relatives still within the reach of the Thapas.
On 4 July, Brahma Shah informed Edward Gardner that he had
received a favourable answer from Kathmandu, and the following day
Edward Gardner’s own instructions to open negotiations arrived. Brahma
being ill, it was Rudra Vir Shah who crossed the Kali to confabulate. Lie was
more aggressive and stronger-willed than his brother, and when he heard
Gardner’s demand for the whole of the Tarai he flatly refused to entertain
such a sacrifice. With great emphasis he told Gardner that he was authorized
to cede no more than the western hill provinces, and that the Tarai was the
most vital source of the wealth of his state. Take away the lowlands, he
insisted, and national penury would ensue. Unconditional powers to treat
subsequently arrived, but Rudra Vir refused to change his attitude. He had
several more interviews with Gardner, some of them in company with his
brother, and at all of them he reiterated the same arguments in a tone
increasingly acrimonious. At the last he became almost violent. He informed
the Political Agent
that others might negotiate on these grounds; but that for himself he would
not accept of a commission for that purpose . . . That it was what would never
be consented to at Nepal, and was, a subject, in fact, lie had received no
orders or authority to treat of ...That if this point were insisted upon, it would
occasion a popular war in which every subject of Nepal would personally
engage; that hitherto many of the chief people had kept aloof through party
feelings and disapprobation of the contest the Thapa faction had involved
them in; but no sooner should it he known that we insisted on the
dismemberment of the whole Tarai, than all party faction would he forgotten
in the general cause, and everyone unite in the general defence.
222
Even the normally mild and timid Brahma Shah was infected by his brother’s
vehemence, and met all Gardner’s renonstrances with steady pertinacity.162
Such a reaction was not, in fact, unreasonable. The Tarai estates were
the main source of income for the Gurkha government and nobles, all other
land being assigned to the army in lieu of payment. But Gardner knew
nothing of this, and was convinced that all these protestations were
subterfuge; that the Shah brothers were holding in reserve concessions
which they had been authorized to make, in the hope of securing a cheap
peace. This would not only enhance their political prestige; it would also, in
the case of Rudra Vir, at least, who possessed extensive estates in the Tarai,
preserve personal interests. Hastings was of the same opinion, and he
agreed that Rudra Vir probably greatly exaggerated the importance of the
lowlands in the national economy. Nevertheless, if the Gurkha’s demurring
had failed to persuade him that a relaxation of his demands concerning the
Tarai was necessary in order to secure a settlement, it had convinced him
that such a relaxation would make the settlement, once concluded, more
permanent. Above all else, he was anxious to avoid extorting from the
Gurkhas a treaty which they would dishonour as soon as his back was
turned. Events during the early period of the Bengal army’s preoccupation in
the mountains had, to his mind, presented a striking portent of the situation
which might arise if the British challenged the Maratha powers of central India
before the Gurkha threat had been exorcised. There had been simultaneous
and ominous stirrings among all the Company’s potential antagonists. Ranjit
Singh, had, in November 1814, marched his army to precisely that point
whence he had intended to cross the Sutlaj in i8o8, while the whole British
force on the east bank of the river consisted only of the two squadrons of
native cavalry at Ludhiana. Sindhia, the Maratha Raja of Gwalior, had taken
the first step towards a revival of the Maratha confederacy, by concluding an
alliance with Berar in contravention of the treaties of 1805. Amir Khan, the
leader of the Pathan mercenaries of central India, had collected an army said
to be 30,000 strong on the borders of Jaipur, in Rajputana, only twelve
marches from Delhi, while Sir William Keir Grant, commanding the remainder
of the 2nd (Meerut) Division of the Field Army, had little more than a single
battalion of native infantry with which to oppose him. Disquieting reports had
arrived from the north-east to the effect that Gurkha vakils had been received
in Bhutan, and that Bhutanese troops were accumulating in the passes of the
162
P.R.N.W., pp.802—9.
223
Bhutan-Nepal boundary. Finally, the long-truculent King of Burma had been
known to be watching events in India with interest, and to have made secret
communication with Nepal. ‘The cloud which overhangs us is imposing’, the
Governor-General had noted in his Journal; and Metcalfe, surveying the
scene from the Delhi Residency, had been convinced that the end was at
hand. ‘I, who have always thought our power in India precarious, cannot help
thinking that our downfall has already commenced.’163 So pressing had been
the emergency, that urgent requests for European troops had been sent to
Ceylon, the Cape of Good Hope, Mauritius and even to England.
During the ensuing months the immediate crisis, it was true, had
passed. Ranjit Singh had been distracted by a recrudescence of his quarrel
with the Amir of Kabul; Sindhia’s generals had fallen to fighting among
themselves; Berar had been effectively overawed by the dispatch of an army
of observation, 10,000 strong, from Madras to the northern border of the
dominions of the Nizam of the Deccan; and apprehension concerning the
intentions of the Deb Raja of Bhutan had been dissipated. Relations with this
last monarch had, in fact, become so promising that the British authorities
were disposed to think, for the moment, that they had found a new ally rather
than a new enemy. He had most convincingly disavowed inimical intentions,
and had agreed to an exchange of vakils, whose purpose was both to settle
the boundary disputes between the Company and Bhutan, and to afford a
medium for British explanations concerning the war to the Chinese authorities
in Lhasa.
But, however transitory, these menaces had buttressed the Governor—
General’s conviction that there existed an incipient danger of collaboration
among the native states which must be nipped in the bud by the
establishment of an effective British hegemony, and his main concern
throughout the negotiations with Nepal was to secure a peace which would
indispose the Gurkhas to re-enter the conflict when British energies were
absorbed in central India. To make this object sure, he now realized that he
would have to make concessions; but he equally realized that the
concessions roust he granted from a position of strength—that is to say, after
the Gurkhas had eaten humble pie and agreed to the terms originally
proposed. To grant concessions before they had avowed submission would,
by giving an impression of weakness, merely whet their appetite for revenge.
163
Kaye, Life of Metcalfe,i.402.
224
As a reward, therefore, for submission, Gurkha nobles nominated by the
durbar were to be offered either iagirs in the Tarai or pensions, for life.
Hastings had no serious apprehensions that the Gurkhas would reject
his terms of pacification; but he nevertheless took the precaution of ordering
preparations to be made in every department for a renewal of the war.
It soon seemed that his optimism was justified. No sooner had they
learned of the collapse of negotiations in Brahma Shah’s quarter, than Bhim
Sen Thapa and the Raja hastened to reopen the communication through
Gajraj Misra. Wrote Bhim Sen to the guru: ‘All our hopes rest on you. This
state will agree to whatever you may do, and I charge myself with the
ratification of it . . . Bring the subject to a conclusion by whatever means it
can be effected, consistently with the public interest and your own reputation.’
Towards the end of August, Chandra Sekhar, who had gone to Kathmandu to
report the negotiations with Bradshaw in greater detail to the durbar, returned
with more letters for Gajraj Misra. Their tone was in harmony with that of the
previous one. Wrote the Raja: ‘The country towards Kumaun in the west, and
the Tarai, have lately been conquered by the British Government. With
regard to those conquests, whatever may be the result of your negotiation will
be approved by me.’ Wrote Bhim Sen: ‘The sentiments of the Rharadars164 to
the west are these: “If, for the sake of peace, you will give up to the British
Government our territory hill and plain, east of the Sutlaj to Kumaun, we will
not be parties to such a policy. Rather than with our hands and voice
surrender that territory, we consent to sacrifice our lives in it.” But the sentiments in this quarter are, that with regard to our territory west of Kumaun and
the Tarai, which have lately fallen into the hands of the British Government,
whatever you shall do or say, we will advocate the same before the Raja, and
obtain a confirmation of it.’165 Gajraj Misra showed these letters to Bradshaw,
whom they satisfied that the last impediment to peace had been removed.
The Governor-General was of the same persuasion. He forthwith ordered the
discharge of the extra troops who had been enlisted for the war emergency,
and shortly afterwards commissariat preparations for renewed hostilities were
countermanded.
164
Title given to the twelve most senior officers in the teaks, members of the member of the council of state.
165
P.R.N.W., pp. 824-6.
225
The tone of the letters from Kathmandu was a source of great relief to
Hastings. In his view it was sufficiently humble to constitute that submission
which he had required as the precondition of concessions, and he now felt
able to demonstrate his generosity, conciliate the Gurkhas and bring the
whole business to a close. In government circles, uneasiness at the prospect
of another campaign was growing. Edmonstone and the Council, in Calcutta,
had become so hostile to the idea that they had publicly dissociated themselves from the Governor-General’s conditions of peace and counselled ‘a
relaxation of our demands to the extent solicited by the Court of Nepal’.
Hastings was furious because, after a previous unbroken silence which he
could not but interpret as assent, they had chosen to register disagreement in
an official dispatch, thereby evading responsibility for measures which had
not even been the subject of discussion between them and himself; but
although he took exception to the mode of their dissent, there is no doubt that
he felt the force of its content and was becoming aware that by insisting on
indemnification he was perhaps prejudicing the success of the main purpose
of the Gurkha war. Consequently, now that he was offered the opportunity to
modify his original terms without a blatant sacrifice of dignity, he did not
hesitate to grasp it. Bradshaw was instructed to alter the draft of the treaty so
that it provided for the retention by Nepal of all the lowlands as far west as
the Gandak river which were at present unoccupied by the British; the grant
of pensions for two lives to selected nobles; and the relinquishment of the
demand for the surrender of the Gurkha official responsible for the atrocities
in Butwal in 1814. Thus revised, the treaty166 was not thereafter altered; but
Bradshaw was given latitude to modify it still further. Should he judge that
such concessions would be the means of averting its rejection, he was to
commute the pensions for jagirs, tenable for one life, in the Tarai east of the
Rapti river, and to delete the article stipulating an exchange of Residents.
The new draft was submitted to Gajraj Misra. Despite the apparent
plenitude of his mandate, he refused to sign it until he had made further
reference to Kathmandu. His reluctance was probably not completely
unexpected at Headquarters. Edward Gardner had been having more
conference with Brahma Shah, who was informed of events at Kathmandu,
and he had reported that according to the Gurkha there was no real authority
behind the guru’s commission. Still, it seems, British demands for territorial
166
See Appendix I.
226
compensation were not taken seriously at the durbar. The Gurkhas were
hoping that a show of willingness to make sacrifices would prevent their
actual extortion, and the guru was chary of using an authority which he was
only meant to flourish. His fresh application to Kathmandu elicited an answer
which manifestly perturbed him, and which he refused to show Bradshaw.
After some prevarication, he offered to sign the treaty provided the temporary
pensions were exchanged for a permanent restitution of lands of equivalent
value in the Tarai east of the Gandak. Bradshaw refused, and Gajraj pleaded
for time to consult the durbar once more, But the British agent was adamant
and told him (presumably having judged that the further concessions he was
authorized to offer would not alter the guru’s attitude) that he was at liberty
either to sign the treaty as it was, or to terminate negotiations and withdraw to
Kathmandu. Gajraj Misr chose the second alternative and left Segauli, with
Chandra Sekhar, on 3 November. On departing, he assured Bradshaw that
he would return within twelve days with the Raja’s acceptance of the peace
terms, or not at all.
This was a grave setback, and Hastings ordered a resumption of the
commissariat preparations which he had suspended in September. Sir David
Ochterlony was requested to assume command of the main division as soon
as George Wood had absented himself on sick leave; Jasper Nicolls was
asked to hold himself in readiness to proceed to Sitapur and lead a column
into the hill provinces west of Kathmandu; and a corps of observation was
ordered to be assembled at Lautan, on the frontier of Butwal, under MajorGeneral John Wood.
It was Hastings’s professed belief that this show of determination would
bring the durbar to its senses. Bradshaw was authorized to make yet another
concession, if it appeared that it would tip the balance in favour of peace. As
the final extremity, short of war, the Company would agree, in so far as it
could do so without dishonouring assurances of protection given to the
inhabitants of the Tarai, to restore permanently estates in the lowland tract
between the Koshi and the Gandak instead of granting pensions.
It was the end of the month before Gajraj Misra and Chandra Sekhar
arrived again at Bradshaw’s headquarters. They had letters for the Political
Agent and for the Governor-General from Bhim Sen Thapa and the Raja.
These contained no concrete proposals, but their tone seemed not to admit a
doubt concerning the durbar’s final resolution to accept whatever terms the
227
British would impose. Gajraj Misra was importunate, but as he did not again
mention the commutation of pensions, Bradshaw did not raise the subject
and confined his assurances to general promises to use his limited influence
in favour of the Raja’s hopes and expectations. Gajraj Misra then agreed to
sign the treaty. The ceremony took place on 2 December. Two copies were
signed. One was then sent to Calcutta, for ratification by the GovernorGeneral in Council, and the other to Kathmandu, for ratification by the Raja of
Nepal.
Hastings breathed again. Once more the commissariat officers were
instructed to ‘discharge all establishments and discontinue all expenses’
connected with preparations for renewed hostilities. A special Council was
summoned for the purpose of ratification, and the signed treaty was hurriedly
sent back to Bradshaw. But the months of hesitation, protest, and indignation
on the part of the Gurkhas had not been without their effect on the GovernorGeneral. He realized that the treaty had been wrung from an unwilling and
unconsoled foe, and appreciated that it was therefore liable to be disavowed
at the first provocation. Motivated by this fear, and also by the consideration,
prominent after the recent sufferings of the troops, that its climate would
make the Tarai more a liability than an asset, he now framed more
concessions. These were to be offered as ‘a gratuitous and liberal relaxation
from conditions already acceded to’, after the ratified copies of the treaty had
been exchanged. As a substitute for pensions, Bradshaw was to grant
permanent estates in the originally disputed Tarai as far west as the Rapti.
Hastings would probably have gone even further and offered estates in the
Tarai west of the Rapti, had he not already earmarked that territory for a
special purpose. The Nawab of Oudh had been persuaded to ‘volunteer’ to
lend the Company two crore (20,000,000) of rupees-—equivalent to
£2,500,000. This had formed Hastings’s war fund. He now planned to
liquidate half the loan by granting the Tarai on the Oudh border to the Nawab.
Even the prospect of mollifying the Gurkhas could not deter the GovernorGeneral from this project, which, for personal reasons, he contemplated with
great satisfaction. Edmonstone had been sending to London what Hastings
considered to be mischievous complaints concerning the expense of the war,
and discharging half the Oudh loan in this manner would enable him to claim
that the war had not, in fact, cost the Company a single shilling.
The ratified Nepalese copy of the treaty was confidently awaited; but
time slipped by and it was not brought. Then, only a few days before the
228
interval fixed for its receipt had expired, events took a dramatic turn. Hot with
haste, the son of Chandra Sekhar arrived from Kathmandu with a message
for Gajraj Misra. It was from Bhim Sen Thapa, who warned the guru that
there had been a hitch. Amar Singh Thapa, summoned to endorse the treaty,
had arrived in Kathmandu twith his judgement, it seems, still warped by
acerbity, and whs striving to incite the chiefs of state to reject it. He had
virulently attacked the clause relating to pensions, and stigmatized those
willing to receive them as potential puppets of a foreign power. In order to
allay the scruples he had aroused, Bhim Sen needed a firm assurance that,
after the treaty had been ratified, the pensions would be exchanged for
territory. Considering that this was a situation which called for the revelation
of the special concession which he held in reserve, Bradshaw promised the
messenger, the guru, and Chandra Sekhar that such a modification would
subsequently be sanctioned. Chandra Sekhar’s son then returned to
Kathmandu, followed on 28 -December by Gajraj Misra and Chandra Sekhar,
who went to receive the ratified instrument.
These were the last dealings they had with Bradshaw. Early in January
1816 he was relieved of his functions as Political Agent. Ochterlony was
henceforth to exercise both military and political authority. At the same time,
Hastings privately determined that I3radshaw should be removed from his
post of Head Assistant at the Lucknow Residency as soon as a favourable
occasion arose.167 His conduct had been a cause of dissatisfaction for some
time. As administrator of the occupied Tarai, he had insisted on having
soldiers preserve the crops from possible enemy raids against the advice of
officers commanding on the frontier, who, remembering the unfortunate result
of his dispositions the season before, were strongly averse to detaching small
unsupported bodies of troops. In addition, his manner as negotiator had been
high-handed and hectoring. The occasion of his dismissal was a quarrel with
Ochterlony. Bradshaw complained that Ochterlony was supercilious, and
Ochterlony accused Bradshaw of being obstructive. There was a measure of
167
A private letter from Richard Strachty to John Adam, dated 16 Dec. 1815, concerning the post of Head Assistant at
Lucknow, has this pencil note jotted in the top left-hand corner: ‘to be considered when l3radshaw is removed’. See
I.O.L. MSS EUR/D/585, f. 161. Bradshaw returned to England on furlough whet, his dismissal from the Lucknow
Residency was announced (probably in 1817) in order to protest before the Court of Directors. If is representations
were successful, and he returned to India in 532, to assume the post of Resident. But he never reached Lucknow. He
died at Patna the same year. It was rumoured at the time that he had been poisoned with diamond dust at the instigation
of the Nawab of Oudh. See Pearse, The Hearseys, pp. 218-20; Hodson’s List, Part 1; Political Letter from Pengal, 4
May 1822.
229
justice in both charges; but Bradshaw’s stock was by now too far fallen, and
Ochterlony’s was too high, for there to be any doubt about whom Hastings
would support. Bradshaw received the news of his supersession with a very
bad grace. He adhered to an absolutely literal interpretation of his
instructions, and thereby kept Ochtetlony in the dark concerning the state of
negotiations until the last possible minute. It is unlikely that Bradshaw’s
shortcomings had caused any serious damage to the negotiation; but it is indisputable that his replacement by Ochterlony, who, with his insight into and
sympathy for the oriental character was an incomparably better diplomat, was
a salutary change.
On 23 January, Gajraj Misra returned crestfallen from Nepal and told
Bradshaw that he had not got the ratified treaty. In his absence adverse
councils had prevailed, and the durbar now demanded that the whole of the
Tarai between the Gandak and the Koshi be substituted for the proposed
pensions. He was referred to Ochterlony, who informed him that he might
return either to Kathmandu or to Benares, as best his fancy dictated.
There is no reason to question the essential truth of the reason given
by Chandra Sekhar’s son for the treaty’s failure to gain acceptance in the
durbar. Information obtained by Edward Gardner confirmed that Amar Singh
Thapa had been summoned to Kathmandu on business of state; and
Chandra Sekhar, on his return from Nepal in August, had told Bradshaw that
the Kaji, bitterly opposed to the terms of peace, had been recalled to court.
Amar Singh Thapa’s counsel must have been the weightier because, by a
freak of circumstance similar to that which had obtained on the eve of the
war, his avowed political enemies, the Shah brothers, were in fundamental
agreement with it. The ‘Bharadars to the west’ mentioned by Bhim Sen
Thapa probably included Brahnia and Rudra Vir Shah, as well as Amar Singh
Thapa. So tnuch would seem to be indicated, at least, by the tenor of their
representations to Gardner, and by the fact that neither again gave any
cause to suppose that his allegiance to the durbar was shaky. 168 Bhim Sen
Thapa himself appears to have been an unstable and ineffectual figure at this
critical juncture of his country’s history. The instructions sent to Ranjor Singh
Thapa after the fall of Kalanga, enjoining an attempt to secure peace by
168
It is known, from various casual references, that Brahma Shah remained in the west as governor of Doti province.
See, for example, Richard Strachey to John Adam, 19 November 1816: I.O.L. MSS EUR/D/585, f.212. Rudra Vir’s
subsequent career is so far unknown. It is probable that he remained governor of Sallyana.
230
extensive sacrifice, show that he was still far from defiant and resilient in the
face of defeat, so his professed desire for an acceptance of the treaty had
therefore probably been sincere. But he was very impressionable. Thus while
the moderating influence of Gajraj Misra prevailed, lie had been disposed to
throw himself on the tnercy of the conquerors; but after the return of his
uncle, now the elder statesman of Nepal and the symbol of her resistance, he
had neither the self-possesston nor the prestige to prevail against his fiery
exhortations.
Amar Singh’s belief in miracles had been strengthened by adversity. He
clung to the idea that China might be induced to help, even though repeated
applications to the Imperial authorities in Lhasa had failed to evoke any
sympathy. It is known that an application for aid had been sent to Lhasa, for
the purpose of being forwarded to Peking, by the Nepal Raja early in 1815. It
had been couched in the form of an accusation against the British, the
gravamen of which was that they were seeking to force a passage to Tibet.
Accounts differ concerning the fate of the petition. When the two Chinese
Ambwas in Lhasa wrote to the Rangpur Magistrate later in 1816, they
haughtily scorned the idea that they should ever have sent such a
contemptible missive into the august presence. ‘What has befallen us that we
should communicate the unsuitable petitions of the Gurkha Raja, or of
anyone else to the Emperor, or to trouble His Majesty with such
misrepresentations?’; and, in a letter later intercepted by the British Resident,
the Nepal Raja complained that no attention had been paid to his petition,
which had been returned from Lhasa. But other sources and subsequent
events show that this apparent indifference was mere dissimulation. The
Ambans had, in fact, secretly forwarded copies of the application to the
Emperor, together with the Rangpur Magistrate’s explanation of British
procedure. The result had been a refusal to aid the Gurkhas; but the Emperor
had nevertheless felt the need to investigate the whole situation in the
Himalayas a little more thoroughly, and he had ordered an agent, called Shee
Chan Choon in the English records, to advance from Peking to the southern
frontier of Tibet with an army said to number thousands. But nothing was
known of this in Nepal when the treaty was rejected. The Emperor had
ordered the Lhasa authorities not to divulge their communication with
231
himself—probably because he did not want to encourage the Gurkhas in their
conflict with the British.169
It appears from the report of Kishen Kant Bose, Company vakil in
Bhutan, that Nepalese attempts to acquire the support of the Deb Raja had
been no more successful. A Gurkha ambassador resided at the court of
Bhutan and special messengers had, in addition, been sent there from
Kathmandu late in 1814. But Kishen Kant found no evidence to suggest that
there was any formal alliance between the two governments. His suggestion
was that the Deb Raja was detaining the Gurkha agents only in order to
make the British more tractable in the matter of his border disputes with
Company zemindars. A Gurkha embassy was sent to Burma, either later in
1814 or early the following year, which must have seemed more promising,
because Anglo-Burmese relations had been disturbed ever since 1785, when
the King of Burma had conquered Arakan and made his territories contiguous
to those of the Company; but there is no doubt that, in so far as Amar Singh
Thapa and the Gurkhs durbar were induced to reject the treaty by promises
of co-operation, it was the machinations of Sindhia, the Maratha Raja of
Gwalior, which were their main source of encouragement. Information
obtained by the British in the latter half of 1815 showed that Amar Singh
Thapa’s expectations of assistance from the Marathas were not entirely
fanciful. The British newswriter at the court of Ranjit Singh reported that
Sindhia had sent vakils to try to persuade the Sikh leader to help the Gurkhas
and thus contribute to the success of a grand plan for the conquest of
Hindustan; and in September 1815 British informants in Benares reported the
passage through the city of a messenger from the Gurkha vahil at Gwalior.
He was carrying a letter, from Sindhia to the Nepal Raja, which information
represented as ‘of a nature inimical to the negotiations now pending between
the British and the Nepal states, urging the latter to spin out time by
negotiation and not to make peace, in which case they would be assisted by
the Marathas’.
True, there had been such promises before, which had not been kept;
so perhaps the Gurkha nobles did not really have much faith in Sindhia. But
even if they did, the receipt of such assurances was probably less the cause
than the occasion of the rejection of the treaty. It seems unlikely that a
169
Sec. Cons., 25 Nov.1815, no. 24; 16 Mar. ,1816, no. 51; 22 june, no. 30; 13 July, no. 17; 27 July, no.12; 10 Aug.,
no. 15. See also E. H. Parker’s article in Imperial and Asiatic Quarterly Review, vol. vii, 1899, p. 178.
232
majority in the durbar was reconciled to it. Rudra Vir Shah’s attitude had been
unequivocal, and no doubt typical. ‘ftc acknowledged’, Gardner had written,
‘that if the war were prosecuted it might terminate in their ruin; but that the
result was in the hands of Providence and that they would stand the hazard
of the issue.
Hastings had therefore accomplished only half his aim of leaving a
substantial and conciliated Gurkha state. By merely disfiguring instead of
crippling Nepal he had incensed her leaders without making them incapable
of retaliation. It had become clear that a greater demonstration of his strength
was necessary if the Gurkhas were to appreciate the measure of his
leniency. But he had reason to be grateful, at least, that the incompleteness
of his policy had been made apparent while there was still time for further
measures. The Gurkhas could have lulled him into a false sense of security
by ratifying the treaty and then rejecting it at a later opportunity more
favourable to themselves, on the ground that it had been extorted under
pressure—an expedient at which nations professedly more civilized and
sophisticated have not baulked. Pride, fortunately, has many aspects.
Stubbornness, ungraciousness and intolerance are among them; but so is
honesty. ‘Lands transferred under a written agreement cannot again be
resumed’, Amar Singh Thapa had written in his intercepted letter to the Raja
of March 1815.170 If negotiations for peace collapsed because of his
adherence to this principle, at least the collapse contained a promise that
peace, once attained, would not be destroyed by guile.
VIII
THE COLLAPSE OF THE EASTERN
OFFENSIVES
170
P.R.N.W., p. 554.
233
AJOR BRADSHAW remained in possession of the twenty-tow disputed
villages on the frontier of Saran during the I8I4 rains, when the rivers
Mswirled down from the mountains clouded by millions of tons of slit, and
flocks of aquatic fowl resorted to the flooded rich field. He had with him
three companies of sepoys, a detachment of the Champaran Light Infantry (a
new local battalion) and about I50 troopers of Gardener’s Horse, commanded
by his young brother-in-law, Cornet John Hearsey. This small force was
distributed about the village of Ghorasahan, where he had set up
headquarters. Although fully twenty miles from the edge of the Tarai jungle,
the site was very unhealthy; and during the steamy autumn warmth which
followed the monsoon, the mean became feverish and sickly. As soon as the
waters had subside, Bradshaw planned and attack on the enemy post at
Barharwa, some dozen miles to the east, where the Parsa Ram Thapa was
encamped with 300 mean. His object was clear the approaches to the hill in
preparation for the advance of the main army under Major-General Bennet
Marley. Marley’s force, assembling at Dinapur, was not expected to cross the
Ganges until I5 November; and aware that a premature offensive would be
risky, Bradshaw waited until the I7th before requesting the reinforcement
which would enable him to put his plan into operation. Marley then sent
forward two detachments. Once, consisting of local infantry and pioneers, he
dispatched under Major Roughsedge to occupy the frontier of the department
of Tirhut, which adjoined Saran on the east; the other, comprising five
companies of regular sepoys, went to join Bradshaw. But warned Bradshaw
not to advance too far, because the main army was not yet ready to march to
his support.
Hastings planned that a chain of military posts be installed in front of
the passes into the hills. They would protect the occupied lowlands and
preserve the army’s communications with the plains. He intended that they
should be established after the army had entered the mountains and claimed
the main attention of the Gurkha commanders; but Bradshaw, now that his
force was to be increased to battalion strength, became over-ambitious and
determined to occupy the proposed sties at the same time that he attacked
Barharwa. Instead of moving his force to the frontier along a single line, he
decided to advance along three, which diverged and described an arc some
forty miles wide at their northern extremities. While the right-hand
detachment moved to Barharwa under Captain Sibley, the center column
under Captain Hay was to attack Baragarhi, a mud fort about twenty miles to
234
the west, and the left-hand force, under Lieutenant Smith, was to march on
Parsa, a ruined stronghold some twenty miles to the west again. This project
was put into operation on the night of 24 November, after the junction of the
reinforcement from Dinapur.
Sibley left camp of Braharwa at midnight, with 270 Sepoys and
Hearsey’s risala of irregular horse. They march silently and neared their
destination, which was on the west bank of the Baghmati river, before
daylight. A clammy counterpane of river fog lingered on the country: not high
enough to cover the summits of the mango trees, but obscuring the surface
of the ground. Sibley formed his detachment into three columns and attacked
the Nepali encampment, taking the enemy completely unawares. They had
not time to form and fire blindly through the matting of their huts. Parsa Ram
Thapa emerged and engaged in personal combat with Lieutenant Boileau,
wounding him by a saber thrust in the thigh; but a quick-thinking sepoy,
Rama Sahai Singh, immediately swiped at the Gurkha Suba from behind.
When Parsa Ram turned to deal with this new opponent, Boileau brought
down his sword and cleft the Gurkha’s skull. All the principal Nepali officers
were wounded and deprived of leadership, the enemy troops scrambled back
towards the Baghmati, hoping to escape by crossing it. But wile the infantry
had been attacking from the west, Hearsey and his horsemen had dashed
round their northern flank, got between the encampment and their river, and
sunk all their boats---a daring and dangerous move, which exposed them to
the fire to their own comrades. The Nepalis gathered in great consternation
inside the river bank. And they made for the jungle and the hills to the north.
Again they were checked by Hearsey’s men, who dismounted and blocked
their path. Some threw down their arms and begged for quarter; others
plunged into icy deep icy river and were short or drowned while trying the
swim to safety. It was estimated that about fifty Nepalis lost their lives in this
way alone. The total killed was reckoned at seventy-eight, and twenty-three
were taken prisoner.
Among the latter was the vakil Chandra Sekhar Upadhyaya, who was
captured early in the action. All the property in hiss possession, including the
presents destined for the Governor-General, was sized as plunder and
shared among the troops of the detachment; and Bradshaw, thinking that he
might prove a useful diplomatic pawn, decided to retain Chandra Sekhar
himself in his camp. The Vakil earnestly assured him that neither he nor his
masters had ever seriously expected a British invasion, and he bagged to be
235
allowed to write to the Raja to inform him of the gravity of his situation.
Permission was granted, and under Bradshaw’s invigilation he penned a
forlorn dispatch, describing the calamity at Barharwa and counseling the Raja
to open negotiations immediately.
But the Durbar of the Katmandu, apprised of British reserves in Dehra
Dun, was less pessimistic. Bhim Sen Thapa’s reaction to the new of the
attack on Barharwa was not to sue for peace, but to affect an attitude of high
indignation. He shrilly resented Bradshaw’s seizure of the vakil and his
property, claiming that it constituted a scandalous violation of the basic ethic
diplomacy. Hasting dismissed these protestations. Chandra Sekhar had been
informed of the nature of the relations between the two countries, apparently
possessed no authority to treat for peace, and had been given ample time to
withdrawn to Kathmandu. By remaining the frontier he had forfeited all right to
diplomatic immunity.
Baragarhi, the objective of the center detachment under Captain Hay,
was about twelve miles in advance of Bradshaw’s headquarters. It was large
rectangular mud fort, of some importance since it was the winter residence of
the Suba of Makwanpur. Although it was known to be garrisoned by only fifty
or sixty men, it was appreciated that its high ramparts and deep ditch would
be formidable obstacle, and a field gun was placed at Hay’s disposal. The
route, through short, was interested by numerous nullas, and it was not until
eight in the morning that Hay reached the place. Its occupants were
postponed until the six-pounder arrived. Meanwhile Hay parleyed with the
Faujdar,171and while their leader was thus engaged, all the Nepalis in the
front absconded by scaling the back wall. The gun was not necessary after
all.
Lieutenant Smith, who march to occupy Parsa, twenty miles to Hay’s
left, did not even see the enemy. When he arrived at the mud fort, after a
march of twelve hours, he found its dilapidated works ghostly and
abandoned---though spies soon brought word that there was a Nepali force
lurking in the forest of a couple of miles in front. With the captured of this post
Bradshaw’s plan was all but accomplished, and it only remained to tidy his
raw of advanced posts by moving forwards two companies of sepoys from
Barharwa, which was on a latitude somewhat behind that of the other two
171
An official subordinate to a suba, combining the function of magistrate and revenue collectors.
236
positions, to the village of Samanpur, which was more nearly aligned with
them. This done, Bradshaw declared the Tarai of Saran to be occupied, and
called on the inhabitants to submit to the Company’s authority.
Despite its immediate success, the wisdom of Bradshaw’s tripartite
advance was very dubious. His three advanced posts---Parsa, Baragarhi and
Samanpur---were widely separated; they had no support, because the main
army had been delayed and had not yet even crossed the Gangas; and they
were in continuous danger of attack from enemy bands prowling in the jungle.
By sitting up these positions at this stage in the campaign, he had exceeded
the latter of his instructions and had, furthermore, infringed a regulation of
I806, which decreed that field gins should always be detached in pairs. There
was a single six-pounder with each of the detachments in advance.
Nevertheless, he and the officers under his command were publicly
congratulated by the commander-in-Chief on their success.
It was not long before the serious dangers of Bradshaw’s arrangement
became apartment. Early in December, Lieutenant Smith, in charge of the
western post at Parsa, became positive that he was about to be attacked by
a superior enemy force, and hurriedly withdrawn to join Hay. His arrival was
timely, became on 7 December the pickets in front of Baragarhi were
involved in a skirmish with the enemy, and three sepoys were killed. But as
the main army was by then at last approaching the frontier, Bradshaw
decided not to abandon any of his position. He made a march along the
frontier, re-developing his force so that Captain Blackney was left in charge at
Samanpur, Captain Hay at Baragarhi, and the post at Parsa re-established
with a stronger force under Captain Sibley. Then he formally surrendered his
military command to Marley and turned southwards to meet the MajorGeneral.
Major Bradshaw in Saran and Major Roughsedge in Tirhut having
already deprived him of some I75o men, Marley’s army was less then 5, ooo
strong when he finally left Dinapur. Of these approximately 9oo were
Europeans, comprising artillerists and the King’s 24th Regiment of Foot.172 To
this army was assigned the most important role in the Governor- General’s
grand strategic scheme. It was to seize enemy capital and impose those
terms of submissions which the Calcutta government had judged essential for
172
Later the South Wales Borders.
237
its own security. The route of its advance was left to Marley’s discretion; but it
would be an important object in his operations to secure the three forts in the
first range of hills which commanded the principal passes to the plains--Hethaura, Hariharpur, and Makwanpur.
The service now entrusted to you (wrote the Adjutant-General) is of a
peculiarly important nature. We are about the engaged in hostilities with a
new power, whose insolence and aggression have defied us to arms. The
maintenance of the establishment renown of our country Asia, the future
security of a vast proportion of our dominions, and the prevention of future
wars of similar characters will greatly depend on a speedy and successful
issue to the approaching contest. Of the all operations now in the progress
against Nepal, none can more effectively contribute towards bringing about
an issue then the accomplishment of the important and honorable part
assigned to you in the general plan.
At first it was considered both impracticable and unnecessary to send
the heavy battering ordnance with Marley’s column; but further information
representing the road to Makwanpur to be less difficult than had been
supposed and a prudent lesson being drawn, no doubt, from events in the
west, a siege train was ordered from Cawnpore to Betiya. Marley was to use
this if the need became apparent after he had entered the hills.
The supreme importance of his mission naturally caused Hastings to
followed Marley’s progress with special attention; but this was not the only
reasons of the security. While it is true that his choice of general had been
very limited, there nevertheless remained in Calcutta a very eligible officer,
whom Hasting personally preferred to Marley but whom he had felt bound to
pass over became he was Marley’s junior and not on the general staff. This
was Major-General George Wood, known after forty-three year’s prominent
service in the east as ‘the Royal Bengal Tiger ‘. His part in the capture of
Java had been less conspicuous only then Gillespie’s and had earned him a
gold medal and the praise of the Prince Regent. He was a much impressive
figure than Marley, an obscure old general who had risen without drama or
special distinction, merely as a result of the inexorable working of the
seniority system. Hastings was distinctly predisposed in Wood’s favour. ‘Let
me assure you that your character is too well known to me for it to be
possible that I should not have you in contemplation when I look forwarded to
238
Staffs appointments’, he wrote to him in November I8I4.173 It seems certain
that the principal command in Nepal would have been given to Wood had the
Governor-General not been concerned to avoid an invidious supersession.
But if Hastings was not the man to allowed personal predilections to
outweigh the preference due to seniority, neither was he one of those men
whose concern to act with scrupulous fairness makes them distrust even their
own judgment where the object of their prejudice is concerned. On the
contrary, his sympathy for George Wood made him eager to discover such
lapses in Marley’s conduct as might justify his replacement.
As luck would have it, Marley’s army was detained at Dinapur for two
weeks beyond the date fixed for its departure. Its supply of treasure was lat in
arriving at the rendezvous, and Marley did not care to march until he had the
means of playing his men. Hastings chafed at the delay, complaining of
Marley’s dawdling, and asked George Wood to hold himself in readiness for
immediate service. ‘Wherever you may be placed, I can assure you of my full
dependence on you.’174 He obviously did not expect that it would be long
before as opportunity to dismiss Marley presented itself.
Marley finally crossed the Ganges at the end of the November, aiming to
move to Baragarhi, the central point in Bradshaw’s advanced line of
defences. To save time, the field guns, stores and engineering equipments
were sent directly to the western end of this line, by way of Betiya, because it
was Marley’s intention to enter the hills with his main force through the
Bichakori pass, which was just in front of Parsa. The army arrived at the
southern back of the Great Gandak on 6 December. Because the rains had
been so late, the river was still about Ioo yards wider than normal, and the
even the elephants could not ford it. As there were only seven or eight boats
at the ghat, getting the army across might have taken many days had it not
been for the ingenuity of the Field-Engineer, Captain Tickell, and the cooperation of a local indigo planter, Mr. Moran. With the help of large coils of
rope, cast-iron weights, large slabs of rock from the indigo factory vat and
plenty of manpower---all provided by Mr. Moran---a long pier-head was
constructed to join a bridge laid over the boats and the whole force with all its
173Printed
in Mrs. F.M.Montague, Memorials of the Family of Wood of Largo. Both Marley and Wood were
Company officers.
174
Ibid.
239
baggage and camp followers brought across the river in one and a half days.
By 19 December it was encamped at Lautan, two miles from the forest and
slightly west of Baragarhi.
Marley was preoccupied as he approached the frontier\. News of the
harassment of the advance posts convinced him that he must enter the hills
quickly; but at the same time he was very reluctant to do this without the
battering train, which would not arrive at Betiya for over a week. The root of
his predicament was Bradshaw’s premature establishment of the line of
frontier posts. Marley felt that he had insufficient troops to reinforce them, and
he would rather have protected the Tarai by advancing into the hills with his
whole force and monopolizing the enemy’s attentions. Bradshaw, however,
having issued a proclamation to the boarder inhabitants which pledged them
British protection, was now unwilling to have the posts withdrawn, and the
Major-General was not resolute enough to contradict an officer whom he had
been specially instructed to consult. He therefore silenced his misgiving,
hoping that the confident reports of the officers in advance were well
founded, and allowed the posts to remains they were pending the arrival of
the battering train. They were to serve as bases for his projected three
columns of invasion. But after he had entered the hills they were to be
garrisoned by a levy of irregular militia.
On 30 December, when the heavy ordnance had at length joined the
field train at Betiya and the whole of the artillery was preparing to move
forwarded to Parsa, news was revived from captain Sibley, in charge of the
post. He wrote that the enemy were gathered in some force in his front and
seemed to be meditating an attack. The tone of Sibley’s note was almost
casual, apparently he did not even request a reinforcement; but the MajorGeneral’s suppressed apprehensions at once revived, and he immediately
sent four companies of sepoys to strengthen him. Under the command of
Major Greenstreet, they left camp at three o’clock in the morning of 31
December.
Henry Sibley was brave and very cocksure. He was so confident of his
ability to drub the Nepalis that when he received a note from Greenstreet on
31 December, informing him of the approach of the reinforcement, he did not
even bother to send a reply. Greenstreet, who was as obtuse as Sibley was
self-assured, consequently saw no reason to hurry, and halted on the road
for the night.
240
Sibley’s force consisted of about 360 men, including fifty of Gardner’s
Horse. Besides the six-pounder, he had a small one and a half-pounder
mountain gun. Finding the mud fort of Parsa too small to accommodate all his
men, he had neglected altogether to use this, and taken up a position farther
north. His camp was spread along the western bank of a deep nulla. Serried
sal forest enclosed it to the front and left. No situation could have been more
manifestly perilous; yet Sibley had remained there fore two weeks without
taking any measures to make it more defensible. No trenches had been dug;
no forest had been cleared. He had not even posted look-out men in the
trees. The enemy had excellent cover to well within gunshot of the camp of
both its northern and western approaches. The advanced pickets, in fact,
were merely a few yards from the forest. The only precaution he had taken
on the night of 31 December, when Lieutenant Smith warned him of an
imminent enemy attack, was to put all his men under arms. He was too busy
with New Year’s Eve celebrations to do more.
What appeared to be myriads of Nepalis emerged from the jungle half
an hour before daybreak on 1 January. Officers letter swore that they had
counted five battalions of regular alone. There were also numerous elephants
mounted with jinjals (large matchlocks on pivots, each throwing a two-pound
ball). The main body swept round the left flank and attacked the British
rearguard, which contained the officers’ tents, the magazine and the bazaar,
but which was protected only by the fifty irregular horsemen. These were
soon overpowered, and the enemy rushed among the tents and grabbed
them stores and ammunition. Simultaneously, other parties attacked the
advance guard and inserted themselves between the right flank and the
nulla. Smith was commanding the pickets in front, which were pelted with an
obliterating fire. He called up the small gun, but thing was of experimental
design and the cartridge shells provide too large for the barrel. Only a few
rounds had been discharged before the gun was overturned and crippled by
jinjal shot. Sibley, who had com forward to assess the situation, turned to
hurry back to the main camp, which was being attacked from both flanks as
well as from the rear, but he was wounded twice during his journey: first in
the leg, and then much more seriously in the chest. He remained conscious,
but incapable, and a sepoy ran forward to tell Smith that the command had
developed on him. On arriving back at the main camp, Smith found
Lieutenant Matheson, the artillery officers, trying to clear the ground at the
rear with the six-pounder. But the Nepalis remained inaccessible in the forest,
241
and the shot merely ripped bark from the trees, while his own artillerists had
no cover and were falling at an alarming rate. Secing that the sepoy refused
to advance and reoccupy the ground of the rearguard and that the pickets in
front had been overpowered and were falling back on the main body, Smith
decided that his only resources was to make a circle, and in this formation
the force defended itself and another hour. The European artillerists and
native lascars sweated courageously at the gun. Fore European of the detail
were killed, and nine wounded. Matross William Levey was wounded twice, in
the arm and leg; but he persevered until the priming pouch was blown from
his side and he was forced to site down, cramped with pain and weak from
loss of blood. Matheson then sized the ramrod and the sponge staff and
worked the gun himself, stoically assisted by a native lascar called Salari,
whose hand and foot were lacerated. But after an hour all ammunition was
spent, and with it all hope. Smith and agreed that they must withdrawn to the
old mud fort. Gun, baggage and stores were all abandoned. The Nepalis
could have massacred the fugitives; but they were more intent on plunder.
Sibley, who still alive, had to be carried on the shoulders of four grenadiers.
But there was no respite at the fort. It was full of Nepalis; and as a last resort,
Smith ordered his men to retreat across the eastern watercourse. As the river
was high and glacial, few of the enemy pursued and those of the British force
who managed to swim to the eastern bank escaped. Smith himself could not
swim, but two strong sepoys managed to bring him across. Sibley, like the
rest of the helpless wounded, was abandoned. If his agonies were intense,
they cannot have been long, because the enemy gave no quarter.
Early that morning, Major Greenstreet, ambling easily along the route to
Parsa, was startled to hear the sound of heavy firing. He speeded his
advance; but when within about three miles of the sense of action the sight of
horde of drenched and bedraggled survivors coming to meet him told him
only too plainly that it would do little good to hurry now. Officers who came up
warned him that his small force could do nothing against such a multitude, so
he halted to receive the survivors and gave up the idea of marching to Parsa.
Casualties were reckoned at 121 killed, 134 wounded and three missing.
When he received Greenstreet’s report, Marley was shocked and
alarmed. His depot and artillery train were actually on their way from Betiya to
Parsa and unless swiftly intercepted might be attacked by the enemy or even
led straight into the captured post by their unsuspecting officers. He wasted
no time. Within a couple of hours the whole of the main army was on its way
242
eastward. Before he left Lautan the Major-General sent orders to Blackney,
coming from Tirhut, to withdrawn at once to Baragarhi.
Then came a second blow. Two hours after leaving a camp the MajorGeneral received a hurriedly scribbled dispatch from Lieutenant Strettel,
Blackney’s second-in-command. The detachment at Samanpur had been
attacked and dispersed at five o’clock that morning. Strettel reckoned that the
enemy strength had been 2000 men and twenty guns.
Captain Blackney and all the officers of the wing did their utmost
endeavours to bring our sepoys to the charge, which failed in every attempt
from the very destructive fire which opposed them. It is with the utmost
sorrow I can to mention, that after the action had continued about ten minutes
with equal ardour on each side, we were deprived of the assistance and
directions of Captain Blackney and Lieutenant Duncan (who, I fear, are both
killed, having been very severely wounded and disabled). On the fall of these
two gallant officers, the sepoys became quite dispirited, and began to retire
with some confusion upon which the enemy advanced upon and destroyed
our tents by fire. The village of (Samanpur), in which was the commissariat
depot, was burnt in the commencement of the action by the enemy. Finding
that the detachment had suffered most severely, added to the great numbers
and strength of the enemy, it was judged most prudent to retire; and as the
enemy had taken possession of the road to Baragarhi, we directed our
course to (Ghorasahan), at which we have just arrived. I am unable to state
the exact loss of the detachment, as the stragglers are coming in every
minute.
Apart from the two officers, no men were listed as dead; but of the
seventy returned as missing it seems few escaped alive, fore when John
Shipp visited the suite of the engagement over a year later the ground was
strewn with skulls, bones and even whole skeletons.
Assuming that the enemy had kept in reserve a force at least equal to
each of those which had been detached to attack the out-posts, Marley,
Bradshaw and Lieutenant Joshua Pickersgill, the Surveyor, agreed that the
number of Nepali troops between the British army and Kathmandu must be
something near 13000; and there were in addition reports of reinforcements
on their way from Tirhut and from the west. Wondering how to could possibly
overcome such a force with the means at his disposal, Marley continued
towards the high road linking Betiya to Parsa, and encamped between the
243
two places to await the guns. On 3 January he sent his light infantry and
pioneers north to Parsa, to bury the dead and bring away any wounded who
were still alive. The remains of Sibley, of the European gunners and of the
native Christian drummers were recovered and brought back to the camp,
where they were buried with the military honours. On the 4th reports were
received from Major Mason, conducting the artillery train from Betiya, that
enemy parties were hovering around him, and Marley quickly moved his force
southwards to escort him fore4 the rest of his journey. Much to his relief, he
met the artillery without incident later the same day. On the 6th, the complete
army moved forward again, and encamped about one and a half miles south
of Parsa.
Hastings blamed no one but Marley for the calamities at Parsa and
Samanpur.
While he was delaying at Dinapur (he wrote to Colonel McMahon) the country
in his front was cleared for him by a successful attempt of Major Bradshaw’s.
Instead of profiting by the event and making rapid movement forward, he
sends in advanced two weak detachment. He stations them at forty five miles
of either. He remains utterly inactive in his retained camp for three weaks,
during which term these two posts continued under the enemy’s nose in the
skirt of a forest without a work of any kind to cover them. At length the enemy
appeared to have been shamed into the resolution into the resolution of
attacking these sacrificed parties.175
This was very uncharitable. Hasting knew full well that the advance
detachment had been stationed not by Marley but by Bradshaw, during the
time of his independent command, and he omitted to state that the measure
had received his own approval. He told McMahon that the affair was ‘very
vexatious, through nothing more,’ but the language in which he castigated
Marley for it was quite out of harmony with such a judgement. The AdjutantGeneral was instructed to tell the Major-General:
Your reports . . . are in very point of view unsatisfactory. (They bear the
appearance) of your note estimating these occurrences as they really affect
the state and yourself. It seems at present as if you were not aware of the
heavy responsibility attaching upon you for the loss incurred; nor do you
intimate any sense of the mischievous consequences of this triumph given to
175
Printed in Aspinall, Letters of George IV, ii, p. I5
244
the enemy, so . . . that a hope may be entertained of your starving instantly to
counterbalance them by energetic effort.
Of the imprudence of making this detachment at all (unless suitably
protected) no doubt exist in His Excellency’s mind; but the danger and
[dis]advantages of extending and advancing them was greatly increased by
your remaining inactive in a position so remote and from which no timely
support could be given in the event of information that the enemy meditated
an attack . . .
It was never the Commanders-in-Chief’s intention, nor agreeable to any
of his instruction, that your force should be divided and dispersed over the
Tarai. The Corps under your orders had a specific destination . . . A reserve
follows you for the purpose of establishing posts, covering your rear, and
protecting communications. There is therefore no call fore . . . detachment.
To an injudicious distribution His Excellency primarily attributes the disasters
which have befallen these two detachments.
Scornful of the startling figure which had begun to appear in Marley’s
dispatches, Hasting warned him army of the Gurkhas was known to be fully
engaged in the west, and they had neither the time nor the means to increase
the force before Kathmandu. All this was sound enough. In fact, the enemy
troops operating on this part of the frontier were probably not regulars at all.
Both Parsa Ram Thapa and Krishna Bhadur Rana, the instigator of the
attacks on Marley’s outposts, were subas (civilian revenue and judicial
officers), who normally had only local militia and police under their authority.
But the officers with Marley in the field remained unconvinced. To make
matters worse, troops and camp followers began to desert in larges numbers.
The Iooo militiamen raised by the Raja of Betiya had to be dismissed for
unreliability. The other Company zeminder in the area, the Raja of
Ramnagarh, refused to help, and became so evasive that he was suspected
of conniving with the enemy. The Magistrate of Tirhut set out to raise Iooo
militiamen, but finally had to report that he had managed to enlist only seven.
The discouragements seemed unending, and Marley’s sense of
quandary became acute. It was clearly impossible for him to protect the Tarai
and to advance to Kathmandu while his force remained so small. On
Bradshaw’s advice, he put the issue to his brigadiers. They both expressed
the view that his army was inadequate for the calls on its strength which an
advance as for as Kathmandu would entail. To protect the Tarai of Saran and
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Tirhut; to guard the grand depot at Betiya; to form smaller ones at Hethaura,
Hariharpur and Makwanpur; and to furnish convoys for lines of
communication would, they convinced, require all the 4ooo effectives troops
at his command even before provision was made for an advance from
Makwanpur to the enemy capital. His own convictions thus fortified by their
concurrences, Marley abandoned all intention of advancing beyond
Makwanpur during the present season. He then withdrawn his camp to
Binjara Pokhra, fifteen miles south-west of Parsa, so as to be nearer his
depot until reinforcement arrived. To lighten the artillery and commissariat
departments considerable quantities of short and engineering materials were
sent to be lodged at Brtiya; and as a measure of economy all the coolies of
the engineering department, whose services would only have been required
in the hills beyond Makwanpur, were dismissed and replaced by bullocks.
The Major-General’s change of plan cost him much misgiving, despite
the support which the opinion of his brigadiers afforded; but events of the
subsequent weeks, before Hastings’s responses was known, must have
satisfied him that had it been well founded. After Major Roughsedge had
joined the army in Saran, when there was not a single sepoy of the line in the
whole of Tirhut, the Magistrate received a report from his frontier police that
four Nepali regiment had arrived at Janakpur---then post in the Tarai which
Roughsedge had evacuated. Mr. Sealy trembled, and prepared to meet his
doom. At his entreaty, Marley ordered Colonel Gregory, who was at Dinapur
gathering reinforcements for the main army, to take an infantry battalion and
two six-pounders into Tirhut. Owing to desertion among his bearers and to
the difficult country (‘no regular roads and nothing but rich fields’) the fortymile journey to Muzafferpur, the civil station of Tirhut, took him almost ten
days. Sealy, meanwhile, became almost hysterical. Every day brought fresh
news of villages being pillaged and terrorized; and his thanadars reported the
strength of the Gurkha board force first at 8ooo, then 10000. He made no
attempt to assess the truth of these accounts, which Gregory quickly realized
were highly exaggerated. There was indeed a Nepali force at Janakpur,
which he estimated at 5ooo or 6ooo men; but the frontier disturbances were
traceable to the activities of bands of five or six people, who burnt villages
and stole cattle. Even these incident Gregory was inclined to attribute to the
zeminders themselves, who, he knew, were not averse to destroying their
own villages in time of ware in order to get their rent assessments reduced.
Sealy disputed this; but there is no doubt that the alarms derived more from
246
instances of banditry in one from or another from acts of ware. The Tarai
jungles were infested with fugitives from justices who took advantages of the
general disruption to rustle and plunder. Even in the district of Saran, where
the main British army was encamped, the Magistrate received daily accounts
from his thanadars of villages being fired and cattle driven off; and here the
problem was complicated by a moral obligation towards the inhabitants, who
had been promised the protection of the Company’s government. The
criminals and vagrants in its lowland territories were thus proving valuable
additional resources to the Gurkha government. Their activities were a
harassing distraction to the main British army and the confused the attempts
of British commanders to estimate the strength of the enemy. ‘It is confidently
asserted, and may readily be believed’, Bradshaw told Headquarters, ‘that
may of the inhabitations of the lowland joined in the attack on our troops at
Parsa.’ It was undoubtedly the presences of these uncounted supernumerous which created the impression of such swollen enemy force on this
and other occasions. It should not be overlooked that the collapse of law and
servant, who made private reprisals against depredators from across the
boarder. Cases were reported of thanadars having applied to indigo-planters
for armed men to repulse marauders and conduct retaliatory excursions into
the enemy’s territories.
Marley, still hoping that he would be able to march as far as
Makwanpur that seasons, worked hard to raise a crops of 2ooo militiamen, so
that his regular troops might be relived of the police duties which were at
present detaining them at Betiya and on the frontier; but by the end of the
third week in January not a single recruit had enlisted. He was therefore glad
to take up the offer of Mr. Cracroft, an attorney of Ghazipur, to furnish a body
of horse and foot was also accepted; and the Resident at Lucknow, the Agent
at Benares and William Moorcroft were all asked to recruit men. These
expedients were also frustrated. Mr. Elliot, the Magistrate of Saran, strongly
objected to Marley’s unorthodox measures and reported then t6o the
government. Calcutta then censured Marley for employing such unsuitable
agents as indigoplanters. The troops supplied by private individuals were
ordered to be dismissed forth with and the collector of Bihar was instructed
not to honour, for the time begain, drafts on his treasury issued by Mr.
Moorcroft.
But these were matters for the attentions of Bennet Marley’s successor.
When Hastings heard of the Major-General’s conference with his brigadiers,
247
and of his resolution not to advance to Kathmandu, his patience was
exhausted and he reckoned that he had more than sufficient justification for
replacing him by George Wood. He complained to McMahon that Marley had
countenanced ‘every childish rumour about myriads of regular troops
opposed to him’ and ‘terrified his officers (who supposed him to have correct
information) by the exhibition of his own alarms.’ Marley was directed to
surrender his charge to George Wood and then proceed to Berhampur, to
assume the command at that station and of such troops as it might be
deemed advisable to assemble there in reserve for future objects. George
Wood was at the same time appointed to the staff of the Bengal army.
Elaborating the reasons for his dismissal, Hastings accused Marley of
disobeying his instructions. It had never been intended that his force should
protected the Tarai. The risk of enemy incursions had been appreciated band
advisedly incurred, in the hope that the advance to Kathmandu would distract
the Gurkhas from such enterprise. For any consequences resulting from the
insufficiency of his force Marley himself would not have been held
responsible. The present commotion and paralysis derived from his initial
blunder of distributing his force in weak and unsupported detachment. As for
delaying to await the junction of the heavy artillery, this had never been
authorized. His army had been furnished with special portable light artillery
with the express purpose of expediting its march to Kathmandu. The
battering trained had been provided only as a reserve to be called on in case
of proven need. Subsequent investigation revealed a further lapse of
Marley’s. It transpired that during the period between his assumption of the
command and the repulses at Parsa and Samanpur, the Major-General had
never once inspected his division or seen any crops of it under arms.
Marley was numbed by the news of his disgrace, and made absolutely
no attempt to define himself. Appalled by the prospect of public humiliation,
his only wish was to gave away and hide. He told nobody about his dismissal;
but rumours began to circulate the camp, and soon the wretched officers
could hardly bring himself to show his face. On the morning of Io February,
his second-in-command, Lieutenant-Colonel Dick, was astonished to learn
that the Major-General was not to be found and hade left no indication why or
whither he had gone. He had issued only the briefest morning order, directing
that all reports of the camp were to be made to Dick until further notice, and
the Colonel could only suppose that he had absconded, in a movement of a
mental abstraction. What had in fact happened was that Marley’s sense of
248
humiliation had finally become too much for him. Hearing of the approach of
George Wood, he had slipped secretly out of camp with the intention of
meeting his successor at Betiya and surrendering his command as
surreptitiously as possible. Hastings was flabbergasted, and very nettled, by
the news of Marley’s extraordinary behaviour. He was not persuaded that the
Major-General was insane; but he did not doubt that he was inexcusably
insubordinate and criminally irresponsible. Marley was removed from the
general staff in Bengal, where Ochterlony was appointed in his place; and at
the same time the station of Berhamour, to which he was banished and which
begin so near to Calcutta, was in the nature of a sinecure, was annexed to
the Presidency command and declared to be no longer the headquarters of a
general staff officers. By these two measures Hastings intended to
Apprize all officers who may hereafter hope to attain [general] rank and the
honorable distinction of the staff, that it [was] not altogether a reward for
length of service to be enjoyed in ease and inactivity. . . The liberal policy of
the Court of Directions has not overlooked the claims of unemployed officers
who are no longer capable of fulfilling the active functions of command. But
the General Staff has high and arduous duties annexed to it, which must be
faithfully and zealously discharged . . . The Commander-in-Chief will proceed
to take into his carliest consideration the further course of military procedure
which it may be necessary to pursue in the case of Major-General Marley.
No further measures were in fact taken. Marley’s mansuetude
prevented his ever attempting to exonerate himself publicly; but he wrote
privately to Hastings, earnestly assuring him that his behaviour had been
dictated not by contempt of authority but only by a sense of acute
embarrassment. Hastings, while he had perhaps been indecorously eager to
publicize the justification of his own conduct towards Marley, was not by
nature vindictive; and as Marley’s explanation implicitly admitted that
justification, he professed himself satisfied with it and decided that the MajorGeneral had already suffered punishment enough. Marley was never again
employed either as active services or on the general staffs; but he remained
on the army active list as commandant first at Berhampur and they at
Allahabed. Assured of a comfortable obscurity by the tender mercies of the
seniority system, he was promoted lieutenants-general in I82I, and full
general in I838. He was then eighty-five years old.
249
Marley’s was not the only head to roll. Shortly after his dismissal the
timorous and credulous Mr. Sealy was relieved of his post because of his
palpable ‘unfitness for the charge of a frontier district in time of ware’.
Major-General Johan Sulivan Wood 176 had been directed to advance
through the district of Gorakhpur, along a route about eighty miles west of
Marley’s. He was to quite Gorakhpur town, his rendezvous, as soon as
possible after I5 November and re-established the Company’s authority in the
disputed frontier departments of Siuraj and Butwal. He was then to attempt to
force or turn the Butwal pass and, should he succeed in entering the hills, to
march to Tansing, the military station in Palpa province which had served as
General Amar Thapa’s headquarters. A full-scale invasion of the province of
Palpa and Gurkha was not expected of him, because his resources (he had
some 37oo men and a few peaces of light artillery) were recognized to be
inadequate for the penetration of such difficult country. His main objects were
to create a diversion in favour of the army bound for Kathmandu and to help
constrict the Gurkhas’ channel of communication with their armies in the
west.
John Wood was a King’s cavalry officers. He was pleasant man to have
dealings with: modest and urbane. As commandeer, His flair was for
administration and his weakness the usual concomitant of an over-fastidious
mind---a lack of imagination. He was delayed at Benares until the middle of
November while the commissariat searched for coolies for the public stores,
and company commanders, whose responsibility it still was at this time,
struggle to collect sufficient bearers for the doolies (hospital stretchers).
Mean-while, the Nepalis took the initiative and made menacing movements
along the frontier of Gorakhpur, causing great commotion among the
population. To stay the alarms, the Major-General ordered Captain
Heathcote, who with five companies of sepoys had gone on to Gorakhpur in
advance of the main force, to proceed northwards to Lotan, a village in the
Tarai south of the Butwal pass. He found the going very heavy. While Saran,
across the Gandak river to the east, was one of the most intensively
cultivated and prosperous districts in the Company’s dominions, Gorakhpur
was one of the most wild and desolate. The whole area north of the districts
capital was a malarial wasteland of swamp and jungle. The frontier was lost
in a wilderness of elephants grass and forest, which extended from the foot of
176
No relation to George Wood.
250
the hills to within 3oo yards of the sepoys cantonments of Gorakhpur town
itself. At this time of the year, wide expanses of the country were
waterlogged, and Heathcote had to make long detours.
Wood, with that part of his force which had been stationed at Benares,
arrived at Gorakhpur on I5 November. Here he was joined by the King’s I7th
Regiment of Foot,177 from Ghazipur, and a troop of the 8th Native Cavalry,
from Partabgarh. Certain delay was inevitable, because a lack of bearers
meant that the stores and ammunition had to be transported from Benares by
cattle; but John Wood was fanatically meticulous, and his insistence on
having all his arrangements completed to the most intricate detail before
moving increased the length of his stay at Gorakhpur from the expected week
to a whole month. The inadequacies of his commissariat stimulated no talent
for improvisation. Never was there a more helpless victim of the military
system of supply, whose slow and ponderous machinery required weeks of
precious time to complete the preparations which he regarded as the sine
qua non of any military enterprise. He dallied for porters, even though he
already had Iooo by the end of the November, and notwithstanding the
Magistrate’s assurance that a further 2ooo would be available once he had
occupied the Tarai. In any case, porters would not be required until the army
had actually entered the hills. By the end of the first week in December he
had collected nearly 2ooo, the medical authorities were satisfied that the
climate of the Tarai was now safe and some 35o carts ha arrived from
Allahabad; but even then he did not move. He decided her must wait for the
fifty elephants and five companies of infantry promised by the Nawab of
Oudh, and was still dissatisfaction with the state of his consignment of warm
clothing. Only 23oo woolen waistcoats and pairs of pantaloons had arrived
and, as he disliked the idea of partial distribution, he set his commissariat to
work to make good the deficiency. These, again, would be of no use at all
until the troops had entered the hills. He assured the Adjutant-General that
he was making the utmost efforts to advance as quickly as possible, but
explained that if he did not ensure that his arrangements were complete
before leaving Gorakhpur he would only have to wait at the foot of the hills,
consuming supplies which could not easily be replaced. It was typically of his
thinking that the possibility of a problem concerning supplies outweighed the
certainty of military advantage. By I4 December the native infantry from Oudh
had at last joined; but the Major-General would have delayed even then, for
177
Later the Leicestershire Regiment.
251
the elephants’, for more porters and for his chief surgeon, had he not
received an urgent dispatch from Captain Heathcote.
This informed him that a force of Nepalis, estimated at 8ooo, had come
down in advance of Lotan and was preparing an attack for the night of Io
December. It left the Major-General no choice: he was compelled to act. A
reinforcement was sent to Heathcote, and the rest of the army followed on
the I5th. As it happened, there was no attack; so, instead of resuming his
march, Wood waited at Lotan, was still thirty miles from Butwal, for the
bullocks with the commissariat and stores. They arrived on the forth day,
when Wood announced that he would move forward again---but slowly, so
that the pace of the bullocks would be accommodated and the elephants on
their way from Lucknow not be left too far behind. He took ten days over the
journey to Siura, a distance of no more than thirty miles. Wood also had
intended to establish three ports to protect the Tarai: Palli, in Butwal
department, to his right; Lotan to his front; and Mynari, in Siuraj department,
to his left. But these positions too were far-flung, covering a fifty-mile extent
of frontier, and for this reason he had decided not to occupy them until his
main force was menacing the foothill passes and engrossing the enemy’s
attention. When he left Lotan, he had sent Lieutenant Anderson to the west,
with a force of about 7oo, to seize the ruined fort of Mynari; but on the
reflection it had seemed that his remaining force---twenty-six companies and
a few guns---was insufficient to enable him to Harrison Palli as well. Instead
of sending a to the east, he had therefore written to Bradshaw, asking him to
send a force across the Gandak for that purpose. This now left all his
remaining resources available for a concentrated attack on the Butwal pass.
The old and derelict town of Butwal was situated on the west bank of
the Tenavi river, whose defile formed am passage for the main route to Palpa
from the plains. The pass itself as protected by the front of Niakot, which
overlooked it from the heights of few miles north-west of the town. Originally,
Wood had planned to besiege the fort by ascending the hills to its right and
moving along successive peaks to attacks from the west; but now he revised
his tactics on the advice of his principal informant, a Brahmin called Kanaka
Nidhi Tewari. This man was a member of the family who had served as
counselors to the old rajas of Palpa, and he had been recommended to
Wood by Francis Hamilton, whom he had assisted in the researches for his
book of Nepal. Kanaka Nidhi said that the country to the west of Niakot was
too inaccessible to make the Major-General’s plan practicable, and that in
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any case there was no water outside the fort within a radius of three mile. He
suggested that the force should instead turn the Butwal pass by advancing
into the hills by a less known route to the east, occupy Palpa, and then attack
Niakot from the rear. Struck by the ingenuity of this idea, Johan Wood
determined to adopt it and submitted trustingly to the guidance of the
Brahmin. Kanaka Nidhi then explained that there was a Nepali post at a place
called Jitgarh, which was at southern foot Niakot hill. It might perhaps be
more advisable to reconnoiter and attack this place from the plains before
moving round to take the main fort from behind. He assured the MajorGeneral that it was only are doubt and would give little difficulty, being in an
exposed position at the far end of some 7oo yards of clearing in the forest.
Wood acquiesced without hesitation and on 3 January moved
northwards with a greater part of his army, leaving only five companies and a
gun to protect the camp at Siura. Fore a few miles the march was long the
eastern bank of the Tenavi. Just below Butwal the army crossed the river and
struck westwards through thickest and jungle graces on a route parallel to the
skirt of the hills. About two miles past the river a party under Major Comyn
turned right, climbed over the trembled folds of the lower foothills and made
to turn the left flank of the post at Jitgarh. Wood and the rest of the force
continued westwards for another three miles, and then turned into the
glaucous recesses of the sal forest, which grew thick were the foothills
curved away to from an extensive bay. Kanaka Nidhi directed the way
forward for about two miles. The march was very poorly organized. No light
infantry flanking or preceding parties were detached, with the consequence
that the General and the three companies of the advance guard were startled
to find themselves suddenly in a narrow glade, at the far end of which, only
fifty paces ahead, was a kind of wall, made of large loose stones and almost
concealed by grasses and creeper. Wood was nonplussed. Immediately
behind the structure the hills rose up, crowned by the fort of Niakot, so it was
impossible to go further; but the nature and the location of the edifice ahead
gave it on resemblance to the one which had been described to him. He
summoned Kanaka Nidhi; but the Brahmin, foolishly left unguarded, had
vanished, and was nowhere to be found. There was no sign of life ahead; but
the disappearance of his guide made the commanders uneasy. He sent
forwarded Ensign Stephens of the engineers with a small party to
reconnoiter. Stephens was soon convinced that the place was empty, and
was on the point of ordering his men to enter when thee was a sudden
253
familiar sou8nd, as of green wood split by burning. One or two men fell, but
most of Stephens’s party scrambled back to the body of the advance guard
unhurt, because the enemy were aiming too high. Johan Wood was very cool
and courageous. He marshaled the vanguard into formation, and ordered
them to return the fir until the rest of the column and the guns should arrive.
They fought at great disadvantages. They were fully exposed, while the
Nepalis where concealed by the jungle. Only occasional glimpses could be
had of the enemy as they sidled round round the flanks of the detachment.
Bullets, fortunately badly aimed, sped in every direction. Wood himself was
bruised on the chest by a ricocheting ball.
When the head of the main body came up, led by H.M. I7th, they
approached the redoubt boldly, while the grenadier and two battalion
companies of the I7th struck out to the right of it, herding enemy snipers
before them up the steep flanking slopes of the bay. Captain Croker, who
headed this group, killed Suraj Thapa, a Gurkha chief, in personal combat.
His men successfully established themselves on the slops in a positing
commanding the redoubt, which was meanwhile flushed of its inmates by
Europeans and sepoys. All the officers and men realized that the Nepalis had
lost their initial advantages, and they were confident of victory. But Wood was
not happy. He could convince success only in the terms of his own
preconception. The sharp contrast between the Nepali post as he had
envisaged it and as it really was, added to the unexplained elopement of
Kanaka Nidhi, had disconcerted him and disposed him to expect failure, for
victory in his philosophy was the fruit of carefully laid pains and the reward of
accurately anticipating eventualities. He had no notion of improvised success.
He turned helplessly to Colonel Hardyman and asked him what was to be
done; and when Hardyman replied ‘Support Captain Croker, or withdrawn
him’, he took the line of least resistance and ordered a general retreat,
convinced that this was the only way to avoid a ‘fruitless waste of lives’. In
fact the positions could have been held and even advanced---perhaps as far
as Niakot itself, which Major Comyn had successfully approached by the
eastern flank. As it was, the retreat caused great danger and confused. Most
of the porters threw down their loads and fled, and the ammunition boxes had
be brought away by the soldiers. Even so the British casualties were only II9,
of whom nineteen were killed, while it was calculated that the enemy had lost
at least 5oo killed and wounded. But the Major-General’s inopportune
withdrawal gave the Nepalis the feelings of vanquishers. When Vazir Singh,
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the Gurkha commander, was later applied to for the dead and wounded, he
replied in the insolent tone of a conqueror. ‘I have issued orders to the troops
of this victorious state not to molest your wounded men . . . any attempt to
commit unjust aggression on this powerful state will be severely punished by
its gallant army.’
Despite his assurances, many of the corpses brought into camp had
been shockingly mutilated. The fate of Kanaka Nidhi remained unknown. ‘If
he is with the enemy, I can have no doubt of his treachery’, wrote Wood, with
exquisite inanity.
Johan Wood retreated first to Surajpur, a few miles south of Jitgarh;
and then, when the water there had become contaminated, marched east,
bank to Lotan, where he arrived on 2o January. He was now firmly convinced
that the Butwal pass was too strongly guarded to be penetrated by the troops
at his disposal. Some reports represented the enemy force protecting it to be
I6ooo strong, and he was gullible enough to allow such estimates to
discourage him. Expectations of assistance from the exiled pretender to the
throne of Palpa had, furthermore, ended in disappointment. It had become
plain that he and his entourage had been too long from the hills and had too
little nation of the precise sort of information required by military officers, to
be of any use; while the royal family’s erstwhile subjects were too awed by
fear of something else to do. He heard that the passes farther to his left--especially those west of Tulsipur, which debouched into the dominions of the
Nawab of Oudh---were less carefully protected by the Gurkhas. He therefore
decided to march to Tulsipur, by way of the department of Siuraj. Such a
move could fulfill more than one purpose. The inhabitants of the western
frontier of Gorakhpur were unsettled and affrighted, because Lieutenant
Anderson’s party had been recalled from Mynari 9following reports that 3,ooo
Nepalis were about to attack it) and the reappearance of a British force would
restore calm. It would also be possible to prevent the cultivation of the Tarai
in that quarter, thus depriving the enemy of resources for a second
campaign. The Tharus could be removed from the frontier and resettled in
the waste areas of the Company’s territory in Gorakhpur. Depopulation would
hinder cultivation and would, besides, arrest the illicit trade in arms and
military stores which was known to, be conducted between northern Oudh
and Nepal. These suggestions were approved at Headquarters and orders
were issued that the rest of the 8th Native Cavalry should be sent from
Partabgarh to Wood’s camp, to assist their implementation; but despairing of
255
ever seeing him accomplish that urgent punch into the enemy’s flank which
had been his assignment, Hastings had already resolved that the MajorGeneral must be removed as soon as an opportunity arose---under the
pretence of entrusting him with another command, if possible.
As Johan Wood prepared for his march to the west with his usual timeconsuming fastidiousness, taking a week to complete arrangements for
having his wounded sent to Gorakhpur, it began to dawn on him that he was
begin surrounded. No longer held in check by his presences before Butwal,
the enemy had begun to move down on both his flanks. On his right, they
were intruding from the north-east corner of Gorakhpur. There were no troops
to hinder them, because Marley, his division already overworked, had been
unable to spare men to garrison Palli of Nepali incursions and looting; and
before long similar dispatches were coming in from Nichlaul, farther south.
Martin, the Magistrate of Gorakhpur, told Wood that if he moved westwards
as planned, the enemy might well march in from the east and attack
Gorakhpur town itself. Eight hundred of them, with two guns, were said to
have arrived at Nichlaul. This was only forty miles north east of the districts
capital, where there were only 435 sepoys and three officers.
Simultaneously came alarming reports of Nepali intrusions on his left.
Colonel Baillie, Resident at Lucknow, sent word that the enemy had occupied
the passes in front of Tulsipur and were threatening to overrun the plains.
There was an additional cause of apprehension in this quarter, because the
allegiance of the Tulsipur Raja himself seemed uncertain. He had from the
start shown little enthusiasm for the Company’s cause, and even the promise
that he would be restored to his old hill possession of Dang if he contributed
to its success had failed to dissipate his skepticism. In his opinion the
strength of European armies lay in their artillery and cavalry, and these arms,
he predicted, it would be impossible to convey across the ‘thick jungles, deep
ravines and stupendous torrent appeals for a diversion in his quarters and
had not even bothered to replay when Lieutenant Anderson, before quitting
Mynari, had asked him for assistance. The Nawab of Oudh sent his vassal a
sharp admonition; but meanwhile the Nepalis set about destroying the frontier
posts in Siuraj and menaced the whole area north west of the British army
with invasion.
Threatened from the front and from both flanks, Johan wood’s first
concern was for the safety of Gorakhpur town, and he sent I,2oo men to
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reinforce the garrison there. But he could not decide what he should do next.
To move westwards would expose the districts capital to attack; to stay at
Lotan and allow the enemy to plunder with impunity seemed equally illadvised. Completely nonplussed, he appealed to headquarters for fresh
instructions to match his ‘new and embarrassing situation’. Meanwhile, he
resolved to make one of his favorite creeping marches towards receive the
Commander-in-Chief’s directions on the way.
Hastings’s annoyance at this fecklessness was acute. In a very frosty
dispatch, he made it clear that when the government entrusted an officer with
a distant command, it did not expect to have to spell out instructions for every
eventuality, but counted on that officer’s own resourcefulness. In his view, all
present embarrassments sprang from the Major-General’s having allowed
himself to be delayed for trivial reasons at the outset. He had thereby lost the
initiative on which the whole success of the general strategic plan depended.
He was told that his primary concern now must be the safety of the
Gorakhpur town. If he remained at Lotan, he was to organize the force in the
capital into a mobile column able to strike at the enemy marauding parties--for although the Nepalis may well have had an appreciable force in his front,
the demonstrations on his flanks were assuredly the work of small
detachments intent on propagating an exaggerated idea of their own
strength. If he advanced to the hills, he was to leave a strong force for the
protection of Gorakhpur. But as Hastings had no real hope that the latter was
the course which the Major-General would adopt, he instructed him to send
the King’s I7th Regiment into Saran forthwith, where George Wood would
have better use for it.
Johan Wood left Lotan on 28 January and arrived at Bansi, twenty-five
miles to the west, on 3 February---having covered, on an average, between
three and four miles a day. While he was at Bansi further troubling reports
arrived from the east, where the town and thana of Nichlaul had been
sacked. Then a torrential rain set in. It continued for several days, and so
swelled the nullas and flooded the country that Wood declared that it would
be impossible for him to move again until several days after it had ceased.
The weather cleared; but then more time passed while he waited for
the 8th Native Cavalry, moving up from Partabgarh, and for reinforcements
called from Lotan and Gorakhpur. It was not until I7 February that he finally
struck camp. The old fort of Mynari was only twenty-five miles to the north,
257
but it took Wood no less then twelve days to arrive there. Once in Siuraj, he
began to devastate the country, destroying the crops on the ground and
inciting the camp followers to pillage the hamlets, which had been evacuated
on his advance. Within twelve days he had razed some two hundred villages
and burnt immense store of grain. Meanwhile measures were taken to resettle, in the more southerly areas of Gorakhpur, the wretched Tharus who
were deprived of their lands and homes by this odious but essential
operation.
In the second week of March it became known that ill health among his
men had compelled Vazir Singh, the local Gurkha commander, to retire from
Niakot with six companies of his force and station them in the higher and
cooler regions of Palpa. The news inspired Wood to contemplate another
attempt on the Butwal pass. There were of course long delays before the
thought was translated into actions. He dallied first for Captain Robertson’s
force from Balrampur, and then for the contingent of Gardner’s Horse which
had been put at his disposal in place of the 8th Native Cavalry (now also sent
into Saran). He found that he could not quit Siuraj until Gardener’s Horse had
arrived there, because, heaving inflicted havoc on the Gurkha territories in
the area, it was necessary to leave cavalry to protect the Company’s subjects
from enemy reprisals. Unforeseen circumstance delayed the departure of
Gardener’s Horse from Cawnpore (their commander complained that when
he joined them they were in state of virtual mutiny) and they did not arrive on
the frontier until 4 April. Even then allaying local panic they inflamed it by
ransacking and looting themselves.
Wood did not arrive back at Lotan until 6 April. By then the healthy
seasons was waning fast and the weather had become dangerously sultry.
Yet still no sense of urgency spurred the ambling General’s progress. He
dithered at Lotan for three days and then, with Twenty-four companies of
infantry and 2oo irregular horsemen, trudged north up the east bank of the
Tenavi river. Now hindered by heavy artillery---he had two eighteenpounders, sent for Gorakhpur, as well as four lights pieces---he managed to
cover only four miles a day. On the morning of I7 April, having suffered no
molestation, despite the thickly wooded country, he arrived at a position on
the river bank directly opposite Butwal town. There was some sporadic firing
from one or two guns in Butwal, but these were soon silenced and it
appeared that the town had been abandoned. Some carcasses were thrown,
but these failing to set the town on fire Wood ordered a party of light infantry
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to cross the Tenavi and enter the place. They had waded half-way when
renewed musketry fire from the town’s defences wounded a few men and
forced the others to withdraw. Wood’s big guns gave short shrift to the Nepali
sharpshooters, while his men still held their musket fire in reserve; but closer
inspections had received and confirmed the Major-General’s conviction that
the pass was impregnable. He therefore decided that his object had not, after
all, been to force an entry to the hills, but merely to make a demonstration.
Having thus retrospectively modified his intention to match his
accomplishment, he called off the troops, limbered the guns and marched
back to Siura, congratulating himself upon a success.
He lingered on the frontier for a few more weeks, but passed the time
planning the distribution of his army for the monsoon. Hastings contained his
displeasure, because he appreciated that by making Wood’s instructions so
imprecise he had disarmed himself in advance for the eventuality of the
Major-General’s incompetence. If Wood had abused the sprite of his orders,
he could nevertheless claim that he had created that diversion which had
been prescribed as the guiding principal of his operations. Hastings had been
relocated to shackle any of his generals with fussy directions, only to discover
to his cost that to allow latitude for imitative is to risk that it will, with impunity,
be used for ineptitude. Wood combined a mania for methods with such a lack
of imagination that, after having spent weeks perfecting arrangement which
could only have been of use in the mountains, he adhered slavishly to the
letter of his instructions and never really made a serious effort to leave the
plains.178
While Johan Wood crawled aimlessly up and down the frontier of Gorakhpur,
to his right, across the river Gandak, in Saran, the main division of the army
lay waiting at Binjara Pokhra for its new commanders, Major-General George
Wood. The area around the camp was by now a scene of absolute
desolation. Independently of the depredations of the enemy, the presence of
Wood was not again employed on active services, but this was probably no more than the inevitable
consequence of his returning to Europe soon after the Nepal campaign, where the British army fought no
wars in the reminder of his lifetime. There is no evidence that he had forfeited the confidence of the Horse
Guards. He was promoted in Lieutenant-general in I8I9, and full general in i836. When he died in I85I he
was Governor of the Tower of London.
178
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the British army of 5ooo and attendant public servants and camp followers
who swelled the total to nearly four times that number had fled and the
deserted villages been torn down and used for firewood.
The new Major-General arrived at Binjara Pokhra on 2I February. He
found the troops in good heart. Their appetite for action had been whetted by
an exciting altercation with the enemy only the day before, at the village of
Pirari, seven miles north. Five or six hundred Nepalis had attacked a
reconnoitering party under Surveyor Pickersgill, only to find themselves
routed by an opportune reinforcement from Binjara Pokhra. Almost Ioo had
been killed and wounded, at the cost of only eighteen British casualties.
George Wood was bilious old officer, known as ‘the Tiger’ as much
because of his growling and swearing as because of his courage. He
abhorred risking his reputation, which he hoarded like a miser. When he
examined Hastings’s instructions, he at once smelt a rat. The GovernorGeneral apparently required him not only to undertake a dangerous
assignment, but also to bear the blame for any failure Hastings had made it
quite clear that Wood had been appointed in order to resume active
operations; but his official instructions were very vague. Pointing out that an
advance as far as Makwanpur might still be attempted. The final form of his
operations was left to Wood’s own discretion. To the Major-General, this
seemed to imply that if he had advance and his army was in consequences
decimated by disease, his judgment would be pronounced faulty and himself
be held responsible. Imputing his own cunning in matters concerning
reputation to the Governor-General, he concluded that Hastings had
advisedly made the instructions imprecise in order to insure himself against
culpability in the event of failure. He immediately dropped any idea of taking
his division into Nepal. He told the Adjutant-General that he could not
advance. His discretion warned him that it was too late in the seasons to do
so without endangering the health of his army. Instead, he said, he would
devote his attenuation to expelling the enemy from their advanced positions
on the plain.
Hastings seethed with indignation when he heard of this ‘unfortunate
and extraordinary decision’. Here was an officer who, having obviously been
appointed in order to resume active operations and possessing the ‘apparent
means of including the enemy to submission in a month’, was calmly
prepared to subject the Company to the expenses of six more months of
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inactivity and to afford the enemy time to strengthen their defenses. Wood
was sent a very angry rebuke, and left in no doubt that he would not be
commanding the division in the campaign of the following season.
The Major-General thereupon lost his temper, and retorted that
invasion had not been specially enjoined because it was desired that all the
blame for any failure should accrue only to himself. He was in effect accusing
the governor-General of moral cowardice and hypocrisy, and even the
Bengal Tiger, when his passion had subsided, realized that this was going
too far. Hastily, he wrote a private letter of apology to Hastings, asking that
his indiscretions be forgotten. But this letter which, far from evincing
contrition, invoked the Governor-General’s ‘undeserved imputations’ as the
cause of his hill temper, instead of mollifying Hastings, made him furious. He
disdained to be offended by insults whose vulgarity was now apparent even
to their author; but he fulminated against the idea that his original imputations
had been undeserved. He was so incensed that he waived protocol, sending
Wood a reply over his own signature instead if the Adjutant-General’s:
I had with great pain to myself been constrained to subject Major-General
Marley to the disgrace of a removal from the command of the Saran Division .
. . That fact alone was sufficient to point out to his successor that energy was
expected and required of him. You were the person selected by me for the
command; and when you were submitted for Major-General Marley
professedly that you might repair the mischief entailed by his inactivity, I
should have thought it an unworthy impeachment of your character had I by
any special orders for exertion insinuated that you might not fell the necessity
of it.
You assumed your command at a moment when the spirits of the
enemy had been remarkable affected by the brilliant success of our irregular
cavalry against a detachment of their infantry; you further found yourself
strengthened, beyond any hope that had been held out to you, by the
addition of the King’s Seventeenth Regiment that impression stated in the
letter of February 2nd as so important for the public interests.
Had you, in this situation, informed me that you deliberately weighed
my representation of the benefits to be gained by inflicting a severe blow on
the enemy, but that you thought they would [be] purchased too dearly by
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exposing the troops to a pestilential malady on penetrating through the forest,
and that you would therefore limit your enterprises to . . . attacking the enemy
in their several fortified positions on the plain, I should have had no
impalatable remark to make. I should have lamented that you saw because to
forgo what appeared a most advantageous opportunity; but I should have
given you credit for acting from an upright conviction of expediency, and I
should have applauded you for the vigor with which you projected the
expulsion of the enemy from the advanced stockades.
Nothing of this sort is even the most remotely intimated by you. . . . Do
not deceive yourself. Your neglecting to give me, your Commander in Chief,
whose other plans were to be modeled accordingly, satisfaction on that point,
was no venial oversight. It was substantially capable . . . My selection of you
for the command manifested my opinion of your characters and my personal
disposition towards you. I must not, however, suffer my partialities to betray
me into a parley with insubordination. I desire you as a soldier to say
conscientiously how I, your General, ought to act in the case which I have
detailed to you.
Hastings’s anger was all the more intense because his information
indicated that, had Wood taken the trouble to seek professional medical
advice on the issue, he would have found that enough time still remained for
him to penetrate as far as Makwanpur. If necessary a force could have been
maintained there during the ensuing hot and rainy seasons; but the
Governor-General’s own persuasion was that this measure, in conjunction
with Ochterlony’s successes in the west, would have been sufficient to cause
the Kathmandu government to sure for peace. Furthermore, the lower
provinces of the Bengal Presidency had been mulcted of troops in order to
reinforce Wood’s division; and by the beginning of March an additional ten
companies of infantry, a specially constituted eight company battalion of
sepoy grenadiers, and two king’s regiments (the I4th and I7th foot) had either
joined or were about to join his force. These made a total of some 3ooo men,
and brought the strength of his army to about 8,ooo. This, moreover, was
exclusive of an extra battalion of native infantry which was sent to join
Colonel Gregory in Tirhut. After all these detachments had been made, only
2,5oo troops of the line remained in Calcutta for the duties of the Presidency
and the lower provinces, and two battalions of the Madras army had to be
moved up into Cuttack to relive them of the pressure of duties on the
southern frontier. The 8th Native Cavalry had also been sent from Gorakhpur
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to reinforce the Saran army; but on learning of Wood’s supine disposition
Hastings countermanded the order, deciding that the services of cavalry were
too precious to be wantonly squandered.
Dispatches traveled very slowly then, so by the time Wood’s quarrel
with the Governor-General had reached its climax the plan which he had
devised was already in operation and the season was too far advance for
alterations to be ordered. Having waited about two weeks for his force to
assemble, Wood then proceeded to divide it. Roughly a half was left for the
protection of the camp and of the depot at Betiya, while the rest, with six
guns, was led on a hundred-mile march along the boarders of Saran and
Tirhut to clear the jungle approaches of enemy stockades and pickets---a
measure which was, as far as the disgusted Governor-General could see, no
less hazardous to the health of the troops than a penetration of the hills
would have been.
The detachment, headed by George Wood himself, left Binjara Pokhra
on 3 March. He planned first to oust the Nepalis for their post in the forest
north of Baragarhi; but they heard of his approach and withdrawn into the
hills before he arrived. The defenses of their position were then destroyed by
Roughsedge, commanding at Baragarhi. Wood continued eastwards, past
Samanpur. There was no road, and army went along. High jungle graces had
to be cut away and innumerable channels of nullas filled with branches and
bundles of grass to prevent the gun-carriages from sinking into the mud and
sand. Each operation drew torrents of swearing from the General. At night,
he pitched a very small tent in front of the whole army, so as to be first into
the fray if the enemy attacked. As there were no other mounted troops with
the force, the small band of Gardener’s Horse, under jaunty Cornet Hearsey,
had to control the baggage train the whole length of the way.
I scare had a night’s rest the whole way [grumbled Hearsey]. I did not know
what it was to take off my clothes, long boats or sash at night, or to take any
sleep. I was obliged to be on horseback at eleven p.m., guarding with my
men the only road to prevent its being blocked by baggage. When the force
moved I had to precede the column on its march, and to prevent the
elephants, camels, bullocks and camp followers from obstructing it. . . I
seldom got any food, expect what I carried in my haversack, until 5 o’clock in
the afternoon, and very frequently not then . . . I had all the arduous duties of
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baggage master to perform, and this disagreeable and incapable old general
would not even enter my name in order as ‘Baggage Master’ to increase my
Cornet’s allowance of pay.179
The army reached the Baghmati on March, having ascertained that no
Nepalis remained in the Tarai of Saran. Across the river, in Tirhut, the
situation was the same as far as the neighborhood of Janakpur. Rupitagarhi,
three miles south of that place, was known to be occupied by an enemy
garrison, reported by local inhabitants to be I2,ooo strong. Hearsey wanted to
gallop ahead and beleaguer the place until the rest of the army could move
up to the attack; but Wood would not consent, and the enemy, hearing of his
approach, made good their escape. Hearsey chafed that such a good
opportunity had been lost. The Nepalis were known to be still at large in the
neighborhood, but instead of staying to seek them out, the Major-General,
after only three days at Janakpur, turned about and marched all the way back
to Saran, taking a route slightly south of that by which he had come. Colonel
Gregory was left to deal with the enemy still reaming in the north-east corner
of Tirhut. ‘I swept the whole of the eastern Gurkha territory, destroying
several stockades,’ Wood later boasted. True, he fired the odd deserted
enemy outpost; but he never saw a single Nepali and his main achievement
was to exhaust his army and swell its number of sick.
Once back at Betiya, he busied himself with arrangements for the
dispersal of his force during the rains. The native part of the army and the
King’s 24th were posted in selected positions at suitably retired distances
from the forest, while the rest of the Europeans were remanded to
cantonments. This accomplished, he hurried away to Dinapur, pleading ill
health, but probably also because he wanted to avoid the indignity of being
superseded at the start of the next campaign. Paris Bradshaw quitted the
army on I4th April, and retired to the village of Segauli, where he built himself
a bungalow for the monsoon.
Gregory, joined by his reinforcement from Calcutta Joseph, under
Joseph O’Halloran, flushed the Tarai in Tirhut of the remaining pockets of
money troops before settling his men at Nathpur, on the west bank of the
Kosi, for the rains.
179
Hearsey’s ‘autobiography’ is printed in Pearse, The Hearseys.
264
So ended the first campaign of the grand army. The Terai of Saran and
Tirhut had been cleared of the enemy, and the occasion taken to the
dominions of the East India Company; but such a timid instructions into the
Nepalese lowlands fell far short of the spectacular climax so confidently
envisaged by Hastings. The army was hardly nearer Kathmandu than it had
been five months earlier. All its time, though hardly all its energies, had been
consumed in retrieving the consequences of an initial blunder. Hastings must
himself bear a large share of the blame for the debacle. He had switched
commanders half-way through the campaign more in difference to personal
partiality than to military judgment, and had thereby replaced indifferent
commander by one much worse. Marley had fumbled and hesitated, it is true;
but it must be remembered that at the very outset of his command he had
been upset by a double calamity for which he was not principally to blame,
and that throughout he had been assisted by second- rate subalterns and
misinformed advisers. His own tactical ideas had been perfectly sound, and it
is quite possible that, had he been given an opportunity to collect his wits, her
would have attempted that advance on Makwanpur which, had it been
successful, would (as Hastings himself admitted) probably have brought the
Gurkhas to their knees. Whether it would have been successful is another
matter. The main pass, the Bichakori, was in fact impregnable, and it was
only by extraordinary good luck that a vastly better general with a much
larger army managed to turn it and reach Makwanpur the following year.
Perhaps, in refusing to advance, Wood had done the right thing. But the fact
remains that he had done it for entirely wrong reasons.
His fondly treasured reputation did not suffer. Together with Gillespie
and Martindell he was gazetted K.C.B. in April I8I5, and in I8I2Ihe was
promoted lieutenant- general. But during the remaining half-dozen years of
his service life India, Hastings never again gave him a field command.
There was one crumb of consolation for the Commander-in-Chief.
Captain Barre Latter, entrusted with the defence of the frontier beyond the
Kosi, surpassed himself. The Gurkhas had a major military station at
Vijaypur, and it was feared that they would swoop down into the fen of reeds,
brushwood and moist grasses that was northern Purnea. According to a
knowledgeable Brahmin prisoner, the enemy had some 7,000 musketeers
and 5,000 archers in the eastern hills. To hold this force in check, Latter had
only 1,2oomen at first, and no more than 2,700 ultimately, of whom about half
where irregulars of the new and untried Rampur Local Battalion. On top of
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this, he found the civil authorities unhelpful and even downright Obstructive.
Mr. C. R. Martin, the Magistrate of Purnea, was so abusive and his
successor, Mr. Halhed, had no idea of how to behave in time of war. He
inflamed the general agitation along the frontier by chasing up and down with
two local indigo-planters and their henchmen, by sending peasants into
Nepalese territory to recover property allegedly seized by the enemy and by
propagating the most absurdly exaggerated estimates of the enemy’s
strength. He upset Latter’s dispositions by detaining at Kursa Kanta a
reinforcement destined for a threatened post at Sissugatchi. Yet despite
these frustrations Latter managed not only to hold the Gurkhas in check, but
also to wrest from them large segments of the Morang. He attacked their
lowlands posts at Dhanpura10 and Jhapa, whence they withdrew eastwards
across the Mechi to Bansgaon. This post was only a few miles north of
Latter’s own headquarters at Titalia. With the aid of a spyglass he was able to
assess the strength of their accumulated forces as something near 4, ooo.
Early in March, latter made plans to call in all his detachments and mount a
concentrated attack on Bansgaon; but then, soon after noon on 8 March, all
the troops there withdrew into the forest, apparently having decided that they
were not strong enough to resist a British attack. Almost the whole of the
Morang was now controlled by the Company.
The operations in Latter’s quarter were all the more gratifying to
Headquarters because their effect was not confined to the lowlands. It was in
the eastern hills that there at last occurred a stirring among the mountaineers
in support of the British effort. Not that this co-operation came whence it had
most confidently been expected. The heirs of the quondam Makwanpur
empire had proved as ineffectual as all the other exiled hill chiefs, and the
rather native expectation of Hastings---who was imbued with the legitimist
ideas fashionable in contemporary Europe---that the Kiratas would flock to
the slandered of their ancient prices, had proved sadly lacking in foundation.
Bradshaw had sent the brother of the surviving pretender to Latter’s camp,
Koilia, or Koileah, is the name featuring in the MS dispatches, which corresponds to no name on available
maps. It is clear, however, from references to its position, that this post was somewhere in the neighborhood
of modern Birathnagar and Rangeli. Kumari Swami, a Vijaypur Brahmin captured in the Morang in
February, referred to the same enemy post as being at Dhunpalna (sic, in Enclosures to Secret Despatches
from Bengal, vol.9, no. 394). It was therefore probably at Dhanpur, marked just north of Birathnagar on
Percival Landon’s map.
10
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but his efforts to raise a force of Kiratas had proved as futile as Latter had
predicted, and he had been sent crestfallen back to Betiya. The bill chief who
rose to the occasion was the young Raja of Sikkim, who, with his old Lepcha
general, Lepcha chagzod (minister) and band of loyal retainers, was still
flouting the Gurkhas from Gangtok. Quite spontaneously, the minister wrote
to Latter, enclosing a letter from his master to the Governor-General,
suggesting that if the British occupied themselves with conquering the
lowlands, their men would attack the Gurkhas in the hills. The only help they
asked for was gunpowder and musket flints. Latter eagerly responded. He
sent ten seers (about 2o lb) of gunpowder and 2oo flints, and advised the
Sikkimese leaders to direct their efforts against the fort of Nagri. This was a
stronghold in the hills about twenty-five miles north of Titalia, in a position of
great strength and traditionally the residence of the headman of the Lepcha
tribe. Yuk Namchu, the brother of the Raja’s minister, having died, this office
was now filled by the minister’s young son who was kept as a virtual prisoner
at Nagri by his Gurkha coadjutor, Gentri Khatri. The Raja’s emissaries had
been confident if Nagri was taken, all the Lepchas with Gentri Khatri would
desert.
At first, Latter had been keen to make plans for concerted action with
the Sikkimese, undertaking to attack Nizamtara while they dealt with Nagri;
but news of the reverses suffered by Marley’s army caused him to abandon
the idea, and he warned the Raja’s agents that their people should only
assault Nagri if they felt strong enough to succeed alone. Notwithstanding
this caution, the Raja’s minister insinuated himself into Nagri in the place of
his son, who was spirited away to Gangtok, and then worked to undermine
the Gurkha position from within, while the Raja’s troops awaited their
opportunity at a short distance outside. After his own successful advance on
Nizamtara and Bansgaon, Latter encouraged the Raja to exploit this
diversion to press home his attack. The Sikkimese army assaulted Nagri, but
found itself outnumbered, the garrison having been reinforced by troops from
Bansgaon. There was a contest which lasted three days, but little impression
could be made with bows and arrows against Nepali firearms, and a request
for assistance was sent to Titalia. At the beginning of May, Latter decided to
make personal inspection of the scene of operation; but his strength was
already undermined by mouths of overwork, and now that the hot weather
had arrived he swiftly fell a victim to some jungle fever or infection. He was
forced to go to Rangpur to recuperate. David Scott, the Magistrate of
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Rangpur, assumed charge of the correspondence with the Sikkimese, and
July sent a consignment of muskets to the force before Nagri. He had heard
that the Raja’s army was now blocking the place, with the help of 2oo soldiers
from Tibet. Soon after, however, the rains set in, and the messenger sent
with the muskets found that the besiegers had been forced to withdraw into
the mountains.
So here too operations fizzled out; but enough had been achieved to
compensate in some measure for the puny efforts of the generals in
command of the two principal columns. It had been demonstrated that even
the Gurkhas’ regulars, on the plains at least, were far from formidable
antagonists when confronted with well-armed troops incisively led and
shrewdly disposed; and this made it doubly shameful that the main invading
columns had been confounded by mere police and militia leaves,
supplemented by mobs of scavengers who were scarcely clothed, let alone
armed.
(By the curtsey of John Pemble “The Invasion of Nepal” -1971)
268